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THE EUROPEAN WAR OF 1914: 

Its Causes, Purposes, and Probable Results 



THE 

JROPEAN WAR OF 1914: 

ITS CAUSES, PURPOSES, AND 
PROBABLE RESULTS 



By 
John William Burgess, Ph.D., J.U.D., LL.D. 

Formerly Professor of Constitutional and International Law, and Dean 

of the Faculties of Political Science, Philosophy, and Pure 

Science, in Columbia University, New York City 




CHICAGO 

A. C. McCLURG & CO. 

1915 



'>^ 



-^^ 



^ 



Copyright 

A. C. McCIurg & Co. 

1915 



Published April, 1915 



W. p. HAUL PRINTING COMMNY, CMICAQO 

r 



APR 30 i9l5 



CIA398623 



PREFACE 

^ ^T^HE contents of this little book were pre- 
pared some months ago, but its appear- 
ance has been intentionally delayed until this 
time. I am not sure that its publication even 
now is not premature. 

It is a fact of history as well as personal 
experience that the majority is generally on 
the wrong side of every great question in the 
beginning. I myself have seen this country 
in hysteria four times during my own con- 
scious existence. The first time was the Anti- 
Abolitionist craze, when the North as well as 
the South rose in what men then fancied to be 
righteous indignation against these assailants 
of the existing order and the public peace, the 
despised Garrisonians, but what really was 
only the rage of a guilty conscience trying to 
deaden itself to the knowledge of the sin it 
was supporting. And then in less than five 
years I saw these same men leading the vast 
choir of the majority and singing the battle 
hymn of freedo;n. 



Preface 

The second time was the greenback craze 
and the third time was the free-silver craze, 
when, in spite of the jejuneness of the sub- 
ject, the great majority were so affected by it 
and worked themselves up to such a pitch of 
self-righteousness against the rascals, who 
would make the debtor pay in appreciated 
money, as almost to silence their contention 
for a sound and honest currency. It took all 
of the official and moral power of four Presi- 
dents, Grant, Hayes, Cleveland, and McKin- 
ley, to stem this torrent of popular holiness, 
make men exercise a little common sense, and 
feel a little common honesty. And yet I 
hardly know a man today who is not ashamed 
if his grandfather was touched by either of 
these follies. 

And now for six months we have had the 
Anti-German craze, perhaps the most unrea- 
sonable of all — for who is so blind as not to 
perceive with a glance that the united triumph 
of the Autocrat of the Land and the Autocrat 
of the Sea means their dominance of the 
world ; and what have the Germans ever done 



Preface 

I to us to deserve abuse at our hands — but 
perhaps the most explicable of them all, for 
if the majority has so little correct under- 
standing, in the beginning, of domestic ques- 
tions, such as I have cited, how can it be ex- 
pected to have any comprehension whatever 
of a great foreign movement, epochal in civi- 
lization, such as that with which the Euro- 
pean world is now convulsed? 

It was quite inevitable that the attention 
of the vast majority should be riveted prima- 
rily upon some of the nearer lying, more un- 
importance, incidents di the movement, and 
that these should be misinterpreted and these 
misinterpretations become exaggerated until 
they should finally assume the form of carica- 
ture and catchword. There are some evi- 
dences at present that we are beginning to 
emerge from this spell of excited and mis- 
guided feeling and to look at things more 
calmly and objectively. It is this which has 
encouraged me to release this little volume 
for publication at this juncture. 
March, igi^. J. W. B. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I The Occasions of the War ... i 

II The Proximate Causes of the War . 45 

III The Underlying Causes of the War . 82 

IV American Interests in the Outcome of 

the War ii3 

V The Austro-Hungarian Empire and 

the Crime at Sarajevo . . . . I55 

VI Belgian Neutrality 167 

VII The Export of Arms and Munitions 

to Belligerents I79 

VIII The German Emperor 189 

Index 203 



THE EUROPEAN WAR OF 1914 



CHAPTER I 

THE OCCASIONS OF THE WAR 

^T^O a man who, for nearly fifty years, has 
been accustomed almost daily to read 
and Interpret diplomatic papers, and whose 
profession It was for nearly forty years to 
teach others how to read and interpret them, 
it seems a remarkable phenomenon that the 
British White Paper has been, with such 
unanimity, in this country, assumed to show 
that Sir Edward Grey was the prime apostle 
of peace throughout the period of active dip- 
lomatic intercourse just preceding the out- 
break of the war which Is now devastating 
Europe. I have read all of the numbers of 
this paper through many times and can repeat 
verbatim the language of those which are 
pivotal and crucial, and I am quite sure that 

I 



The ^European War 



there is another way to interpret that paper, 
a way more consistent in theory, more intel- 
ligible throughout, and more naturally con- 
nected with preceding movements, than the 
interpretation so generally regarded in this 
co,untry as the only possible one. 

In approaching this subject I will ask my 
readers to keep three things well in mind. 
The first is that this British White Paper does 
not present the causes of this war nor its pur- 
poses, but only the occasions of it. The 
causes of the war lie far back of anything 
contained in this paper. They are, as will be 
demonstrated more fully in the next chapter, 
the determination of Russia to dominate the 
Balkan lands and to extend her empire to the 
Bosphorus, the ^Egean, and the Adriatic ; the 
determination of France to make conquest of 
Elsass-Lothringen, and the determination of 
Great Britain to repress the political, indus- 
trial and commercial growth of Germany. 
These three things constituted for years be- 
fore the outbreak of this war the chief 
perils threatening the life and prosperity of 



The Occasions of the War 3 

the German Empire and the Austro-Hun- 
garian Empire. So long as they could be 
kept apart, peace could reign in Europe, but 
when they were brought together in what was 
first called the Triple Entente, and this 
Entente was developed into the Military Alli- 
ance of August, 19 14, then peace left the 
world, when to return God only knows. This 
British White Paper is simply the history, 
from the British point of view, of the way 
in which this development was accomplished. 
In the second place, let it be always kept in 
mind that diplomatic papers are not sermons 
by sincere God-fearing clergymen, nor scien- 
tific essays whose purpose is the demonstra- 
tion of truth, but that the language of them is 
frequently chosen and employed to cover up 
the real purpose and to produce results dif- 
ferent from, sometimes contradictory to, 
those professed to be desired. In reading 
diplomatic papers, one must be able to read 
not only between the lines, but behind the 
lines and before the lines and around the 
lines, and one must never forget that the re- 



The European War 



suits actually produced were those probably 
intended by the successful party. 

In the third place, one must remember that 
most diplomatic correspondence Is verbiage 
and is modified by secret verbal agreements. 
One must be able to select the parts which 
contain the gist of the proposition or the 
argument and free it from the nebulosity with 
which it is surrounded, for the most part in- 
tentionally surrounded, and to apprehend the 
verbal understandings which give them their 
real meaning. 

Naturally, the first thought of the world 
after the brutal murders of the Crown Prince 
and Crown Princess of the Austro-Hungarian 
Empire on June 28, at Sarajevo, was what 
Austria-Hungary would do about it. Nobody 
entertained the idea that such crime would 
be allowed to pass unpunished. The Austro- 
Hungarian government began immediately 
an investigation which lasted until the close 
of the third week in July, and on July 23 it 
made declaration of what it had discovered 
and what it intended to do. 



The Occasions of the War, 5 

It affirmed that it had found that the assas- 
sination of the Prince and Princess was 
planned in Belgrade; that high Servian offi- 
cials were implicated in it ; that the arms and 
explosives with which the murderers were 
provided had been given to them by Servian 
officials and functionaries belonging to the 
Narodna Odbrana, the society for exciting 
revolution among Austrian Servians against 
the Austro-Hungarian Government; and, 
finally, " that the passage into Bosnia of the 
criminals and their arms was organized and 
effected by the chief officials of the Servian 
frontier service." 

The Austro-Hungarian Government fur- 
thermore declared that the assassinations at 
Sarajevo were connected with, and the nat- 
ural outcome of, subversive movements for 
disrupting the Austro-Hungarian Empire and 
detaching certain of its parts, which had been 
for years in progress in Servia; that these 
movements were participated in by members 
of the Servian race living or sojourning in 
the Austro-Hungarian Empire ; that the Ser- 



The ^European War 



vian government itself knowingly allowed 
these movements to go on unhindered in the 
press, in the schools, and in the revolutionary 
societies, in spite of the promises which that 
government had, March 31, 1909, made to 
the Austro-Hungarian Government of friend- 
ly and neighborly conduct; and that the 
Austro-Hungarian Government could not, in 
view of this situation, " pursue any longer the 
attitude of expectant forbearance which they 
had maintained for years in face of the mach- 
inations hatched at Belgrade and thence prop- 
agated in Austria-Hungary," but were now 
in duty bound to put an end to the intrigues 
which formed a perpetual menace to the 
tranquillity of the Empire. 

On the basis of these statements and 
explanations the Austro-Hungarian Govern- 
ment demanded of die Servian Government 
that it should publicly proclaim in its official 
journals that the government condemned the 
propaganda against Austria-Hungary and re- 
pudiated it, regretted the participation of 
Servian officials in it, deplored its criminal 



The Occasions of the War 7 

results, and warned both officials and private 
persons that it would proceed with the utmost 
rigor against anybody who should thereafter 
be guilty of attempting to promote it. 

The Austro-Hungarian Government also 
demanded, more specifically, the suppres- 
sion of publications inciting the people to ac- 
tions against the peace and integrity of Aus- 
tria-Hungary, the dissolution of all societies 
in Servia whos€ aim was the promotion of 
this propaganda, the elimination fro.m the 
public instruction of everything encouraging 
the same, the removal of all officials from 
the public service guilty of promoting this 
propaganda, the arrest and trial of those offi- 
cials shown by the Austro-Hungarian inquiry 
to have been implicated in the assassinations 
of June 28, the prevention of illicit traffic in 
arms and explosives from Servia across the 
frontier between Servia and Austria-Hun- 
gary, the dismissal and punishment of the 
Servian frontier officials who had facilitated 
the work of the assassins, and explanation of 
the utterances of high Servian officials 



8 The ^European War 

approving the murder of the Prince and 
Princess. 

Finally, in order to make sure that the Ser- 
vian Government would sincerely meet these 
requirements, the Austro-Hungarian Govern- 
ment demanded that representatives of Aus- 
tria-Hungary should be allowed to cooperate 
with the Servian Government in the inquiry 
as to the accomplices on Servian territory in 
the murders of the Prince and Princess, and 
in the suppression of subversive movements 
directed against the integrity of the Austro- 
Hungarian Empire. 

This was a firm and decided demand, but 
it was required by the necessities of the situa- 
tion. Here was a turbulent community — I 
will not call it a state, because one of the 
chief characteristics of a state is that it is 
organized, legalized morality — a turbulent 
community guided largely in its acts and pur- 
poses by insurgents, conspirators, and regi- 
cides, a community which had already twice, 
between 1908 and 19 14, by its lawless con- 
duct brought Austria-Hungary tQ the verge 



The Occasions of the War 9 

of war, a community which had, between the 
same periods, been under solemn and express 
pledges to Austria-Hungary to cease its In- 
trigues and machinations against that country 
and to live in frank and friendly relations 
with it, but which, in constant disregard of 
this pledge, and of its duty independent of 
the same, continued to weave its plots for the 
dismemberment of the Austro-Hungarian 
Empire, and finally instigated the foul mur- 
der of the heir to the Austro-Hungarian 
crown, with the purpose of producing just 
what has happened, namely: a European war 
for the destruction of the Austro-Hungarian 
and the German Empires. The demands, 
therefore, on the part of Austria-Hungary 
that this criminal conspiracy and these crim- 
inal acts against her existence should immedi- 
ately cease, as well as the press and school 
propaganda encouraging them, and that the 
chief conspirators should be brought to jus- 
tice, and that this should be undertaken under 
such cooperation on the part of Austro-Hun- 
garian representatives as would make it rea- 



lo The ^European War 

sonably certain that It would be effectively 
accomplished, were well within the bound- 
aries of the provocation. 

Only a little more than a year ago our 
government demanded that a Mexican Gov- 
ernment should step down and out because 
our President believed that Huerta had had 
some part In the assassination of his predeces- 
sor, Madero, and our government enforced 
this demand. Let us suppose now that our 
own Vice-President and his wife had gone 
for an official visit to Austin, Texas, and had 
there been assassinated. In the execution of a 
plot hatched In Mexico City, In which the 
highest officials of the Mexican Government 
had been found to be Implicated, and for the 
accomplishment of which the weapons had 
been furnished from the Mexican Govern- 
mental arsenal, and that the murderers and 
weapons had been knowingly passed across 
the frontier by Mexican officials, and that all 
this had been done as part of a conspiracy 
formed In Mexico, by the leaders of the coun- 
try In and out of the government, for detach- 



The Occasions of the War ii 

ing Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, and Cali- 
fornia from the United States and re-connect- 
ing them with Mexico — what would the 
United States have done? In view of what 
she did do, I think it fair to say that she 
would have slapped Mexico off the face of 
the earth, and that in case any other power in 
the world had interfered she would have told 
it to attend to its own business and stand aside 
or it would be slapped aside also. 

The question between Austria-Hungary 
and Servia was thus one involving the honor 
and existence of the Austro-Hungarian Em- 
pire, a question, therefore, in which, accord- 
ing to the existing canons and practices of 
diplomacy, no other power had any right to ' 
interfere, and which, according to these same 
canons and usages, was not subject to arbitra- 
tion. Moreover, the purpose of this demand 
was entirely punitive. It was not an issue 
under which Austria was seeking her own 
aggrandizement or to disturb the balance of 
power in Europe. She solemnly declared 
that she would annex no foot of Servian terri- i 



12 The European War 

tory, and as a matter of fact she was striving 
to maintain the balance of power in Europe 
disturbed and thrown out of joint by the 
machinations of the powers of the Triple 
Entente through the Italian Tripoli expedi- 
tion and the recent war of the Balkan powers 
against Turkey. 

I have in my possession at this moment a 
statement from an important officer of the 
British Crown, which is dated September i6, 
1 9 14, and contains the following paragraph: 

My own private opinion is that Grey has utterly 
outmanoeuvred the Germans. He began the game 
by getting Italy to annex Tripoli. Practically that 
was the end of the Triple Alliance, as now we 
have a million of hostages in North Africa, and 
Italy dares not stir against us. Then came the 
Balkan League financed by England and France 
and, but for the idiotic vanity of King Ferdinand, 
we should have had the war then. For the last 
three years England, France, and Russia have been 
steadily preparing for the struggle and Germany 
stupidly played the enemies' game. 

The seduction of Italy, thus, from the 
Triple Alliance, and the Balkan war against 



The Occasions of the War 13 

Turkey, ending in the driving back of Turkey 
and in weakening her as a weight against Rus- 
sia in the Balkan peninsula, were the things 
which had, by the beginning of the year 19 14, 
so changed the balance of power between the 
Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente as to 
threaten the very existence of the Austro- 
Hungarian Empire. All the powers in both 
of these combinations understood this per- 
fectly and Great Britain more than any other, 
and Sir Edward Grey more than any other 
man consciously brought it to pass. 

Immediately after the assassinations at 
Sarajevo, which revealed to Austria-Hungary 
that the conspiracy against her existence had 
become active, the diplomacy of Sir Edward 
Grey struck out upon a line entirely consist- 
ent with the antecedents to which I have 
called attention, a line destined to bring war, 
a line which has brought war, and a line 
which if not intended to bring war is evidence 
of great dulness in the mind of its inventor. 
Before the demands of Austria-Hungary had 
become known, he began inquiring of the 



14 The European War 

German Ambassador in London and, through 
Great Britain's representative in Berlin, of 
the German Minister of Foreign Affairs, 
about them. The German Ambassador de- 
clared that he had no information on the sub- 
ject, but the British Charge in Berlin tele- 
graphed to him. Grey, that the German For- 
eign Minister 

insisted that the question at issue was one for set- 
tlement between Servia and Austria alone, and that 
there should be no Interference from outside in the 
discussions between these two countries; that he 
had, therefore, considered it Inadvisable that the 
Austro-Hungarlan Government should be ap- 
proached by the German Government on the mat- 
ter. — (British White Paper No. 2, July 22, 1914.) 

This was absolutely the correct attitude dip- 
lomatically towards the subject, and It was the 
insistence of Great Britain and the other pow- 
ers of the Triple Entente to depart from it 
which started the ball rolling in the wrong 
direction. 

On the next day Sir Edward Grey had a 
rather sharp discussion with Count Mens- 



The Occasions of the War 15 

dorff, the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador in 
London, in which he protested against a time 
limit, which Count Mensdorff had indicated 
might be contained in the Austro-Hungarian 
demands, and virtually threatened him with 
Russian interference. Count Mensdorff called 
attention, in justification of a time limit, to 
the fact that Servia had utterly disregarded 
her plighted word, given ^vt years before, 
to live on neighborly terms with Austria- 
Hungary, and had pursued her hostile pur- 
poses against Austria-Hungary, and that it 
had become necessary for Austria-Hungary 
to protect herself promptly. Moreover, 
Count Mensdorff indicated to Sir Edward 
Grey that St. Petersburg was the place where 
restraint should be exercised. — (British 
White Paper No. 3.) 

On July 24, the contents of the Austro- 
Hungarian demand upon Servia were com- 
municated by Count Mensdorff to Sir Ed- 
ward Grey, and the latter immediately 
declared to the former that he had "never 
before seen one state address to another inde- 



1 6 The European War 

pendent state a document of so formidable a 
character," and remarked that Great Britain 
would enter into an exchange of views with 
other powers. — (No. 5.J 

On the same day Sir Edward Grey received 
a dispatch from the British Ambassador in 
St. Petersburg which manifested a high state 
of excitement on the part of the Russian gov- 
ernment. It ran: Russian Minister for 
Foreign Affairs said that Austria's conduct 
was both provocative and immoral ; she would 
never have taken such action unless Germany 
had been first consulted; some of her de- 
mands were quite impossible of acceptance. 
He hoped that His (Britannic) Majesty's 
government would not fail to proclaim their 
solidarity with Russia and France. The 
Ambassador went on to say that in his opin- 
ion Russia and France had already deter- 
mined to intervene between Austria-Hungary 
and Servia, and that the Russian Foreign 
Minister had informed him that he thought 
that Russian mobilization would have to be 
carried out. — (No, 6, July 24.) 



The Occasions of the War 17 

Here now was the great opportunity for a 
peace-loving British Foreign Minister, If he 
were genuinely peace-loving and not a pre- 
tender, to get In the finest work of his life. 
What would such a British Foreign Minister 
have replied to the excited requests from Rus- 
sia to Intervene In this Austro-Hungarian- 
Servlan question. I think he would have 
said: 

This is a local question between Austria-Hungary 
and Servia, a question in regard to which we have 
no right to intervene, and we must keep our hands 
off. Moreover, it is a question involving the honor 
and existence of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a 
question, therefore, which, according to the canons 
of diplomacy, is not arbitrable, and we should not 
insist upon, or propose, its arbitration. It is true 
that we may think the demands on Servia peremp- 
tory, but we must consider that foul murders have 
been committed, the murder of the heir to the 
Austro-Hungarian throne and his wife, and that 
Austria-Hungary claims that this has been accom- 
plished by the cooperation of Servian officials in 
execution of a plot formed at Belgrade, a plot for 
disrupting the Austro-Hungarian Empire. 

And we must remember that Servia is a rest- 



l8 The European War 

less, turbulent community, a community in which, 
only ten years ago, high officials, the leaders of the 
party still in power in Servia, wantonly assassinated 
their own King and Queen and pitched their dead 
bodies out of the window to be kicked and spat 
upon by the mob, a community which has long been 
the firebrand of Southeastern Europe, while Aus- 
tria-Hungary is a great, highly-civilized state which 
has rendered inestimable service to the culture and 
civilization of Europe, among many other things, 
in halting and settling the Magyars, in defending 
Europe against the invasion of the Moslem, and in 
holding the Slav, the Magyar, and the German 
together in the bonds of a peaceful empire for the 
last fifty years. 

We must trust the word of Austria-Hungary, 
which during the last few years has manifested 
great forbearance toward Servia, that she will exact 
only a just measure of satisfaction for the crimes 
that have been committed against her. If it should 
prove later that she is going beyond this and is 
encroaching upon general European interests, then 
will be the time for us to interfere. To do so 
before then would be immoral and provocative on 
our part. 

Now do we find anything like this from 
Sir Edward Grey In the numbers of the Brit- 



The Occasions of the War 19 

ish White Paper? I cannot discover it, but 
instead of it we find just what, as it seems to 
me, a very clever diplomatist would do, who 
desired to bring about a war of extermina- 
tion against the German and Austro-Hun- 
garian Empires, and at the same time throw 
the responsibility for it upon the shoulders 
of his victims. Now what would be the ele- 
ments of the plan of such a foreign minister 
intent upon such a purpose? Would it not 
be as follows? 

1. To assume the correct diplomatic attitude for 
his own government of non-interference in the ques- 
tion between Austria-Hungary and Servia, but at 
the same time to encourage Servia to resist the 
demands of Austria-Hungary by pronouncing them 
extravagant and peremptory. 

2. To encourage some other power, in this case 
Russia, to interfere between them by representing 
that Russia had some special legitimate interest in 
intervening, some special right to intervene. 

3. To propose arbitration of the question be- 
tween Russia and Austria-Hungary raised by the 
intervention of Russia in the question between 
Austria-Hungary and Servia. 



20 The European War 

4. To represent Germany as responsible for the 
failure to bring about arbitration of the question 
between Russia and Austria-Hungary, without ex- 
plaining that this was really arbitration of the ques- 
tion between Austria-Hungarj^ and Servia. 

5. To do nothing to restrain Russian mobiliza- 
tion. 

6. To encourage France to sustain Russia. 

7. To refuse to enter into any understanding 
with Germany on any conditions. 

8. To find, at the last moment an issue, an ap- 
parently unselfish issue, under which to enter into 
the great struggle. 

Now let us see from the evidence con- 
tained in the British White Paper Itself If 
this was not the exact course of the diplo- 
macy followed by the British Foreign 
Minister. 

(First.) Did he encourage Servia to re- 
sist the AustrO'Hungarian demands? 

On July 24, he said to the Austro-Hun- 
garlan Ambassador In London " that he had 
never before seen one state address to 
another Independent state a document of so 
formidable a character," criticising par- 



The Occasions of the War 21 

ticularly the demand made by Austria-Hun- 
gary that Austro-Hungarlan representatives 
should be allowed to cooperate with Servian 
officials in the investigation relating to the 
participation of Servian officials and subjects 
in the assassination at Sarajevo, and in sup- 
pressing the movements against the integrity 
of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. At the 
same time, he disclaimed any concern on the 
part of his government with the merits of 
the dispute between Austria-Hungary and 
Servia. — (British White Paper No. ^.) 

On the same day, he telegraphed to the 
British Charge d!Af aires at Belgrade that 
Servia ought to give Austria-Hungary fullest 
satisfaction should it be proven that Servian 
officials had had any part in the Sarajevo 
murders, that Servia ^^ ought certainly to 
express concern and regret ;'' for the rest, 
however, that " the Servian government must 
reply to the Austrian demands as they con- 
sider best in Servian interests*' * (No. 12.) 
Xhe Charge was authorized to repeat this to 

* Italics mine, J. W. B. 



22 The European War 

the Servian Government after consulting his 
French and Russian colleagues at Belgrade. 
That the Servian Government understood 
completely the position of the British Gov- 
ernment as encouraging Servia to resist the 
Austro-Hungarian demands is clearly mani- 
fest from the telegram sent by the British 
Charge at Belgrade to Sir Edward Grey 
after the reply of the Servian government to 
the Austro-Hungarian note, which telegram 
reads: " I have been requested by the Prime 
Minister to convey to you the expression of 
his deep gratitude for the statement which 
you made on the 27th inst, in the House of 
Commons.'' — (No. 8^-) 

(Second.) Did Sir Edward Grey en- 
courage Russia to intervene in the question 
between Austria-Hungary and Servia? 

On July 24, he instructed the British Am- 
bassador in Paris that if Russia took the 
view of the Austro-Hungarian demands on 
Servia, which it seemed to him any power 
interested in Servia would take,"^ he would 

♦Italics mine, J. W. B. 



The Occasions of the War 23 

be powerless to do anything with Russia. 
(No. 10.) Of course this communication 
was immediately imparted to the French 
Government and from the French Govern^ 
ment to the Russian Government. 

On the 25th, he telegraphed to the British 
Ambassador at St. Petersburg that the per- 
emptory character of the Austro-Hungarian 
note to Servia made it almost inevitable that 
Russia and Austria-Hungary would quickly 
mobilize against each other. (No. 24.) 

On the 25th, he instructed the British 
Ambassador at Vienna to support the steps 
taken by the Russian Ambassador at Vienna 
in making a demand upon the Austro-Hun- 
garian Government for an extension of the 
time limit imposed by the Austrian note for 
the Servian reply and for furnishing data on 
which the Austrian note was based. (No. 
26.) Here was not only an encouragement 
to Russia to intervene in the question between 
Austria-Hungary and Servia, but a participa- 
tion in that intervention, and that, too, after 
the disclaimer of any concern on the part of 



24 The European War 

his government In the merits of the question, 
as noted in No. 5. 

On the 27th, he telegraphed to the British 
Ambassador at St. Petersburg that Germany 
and Austria-Hungary ought to understand 
from the concentration of the British fleet 
that Great Britain might not stand aside. — 
(No. 47,) 

(Third.) Did Sir Edward Grey propose 
mediation of the question between Russia and 
Austria-Hungary raised by the intervention 
of Russia in the question between Austria- 
Hungary and Serviaf 

On the 25th of July, he telegraphed to the 
British Charge d^Af aires in Berlin that he 
had said to the German Ambassador In Lon- 
don that Russian and Austro-Hungarian mo- 
bilization would apparently soon take place 
and that he had suggested mediation between 
them by Great Britain, France, Germany, 
and Italy. — (No. 2^.) 

On the 26th, he telegraphed to the British 
Ambassador In Paris his proposition for 
mediation in so general and comprehensive 



The Occasions of the War 25 

terms that when it was repeated to the Brit- 
ish Ambassador in Vienna and communicated 
by the latter to the Russian and French Am- 
bassadors there, these men said that while 
they felt satisfaction with the proposition 
^^ they doubted whether the principle of Rus- 
sia being an interested party entitled to have 
a say in the settlement of a purely Austro- 
Servian dispute would be accepted by either 
the Austro-Hungarian or the German Gov- 
ernment.^^ * — (Nos. ^6 and 40.) 

On the 27th, he informed the British Am- 
bassador in Berlin that he had said to the 
German Ambassador in London that the 
Servian reply had gone farther than could 
have been expected and that the German 
Government should urge moderation at 
Vienna. — (No. 46.) 

His proposition at that moment was that 
the German Government should urge upon 
the Austro-Hungarian Government to make 
the Servian note, which rejected the crucial 
demands of the Austro-Hungarian Govern- 
* Italics mine, J. W. B. 



■■■AA*'^'^^-*- 



26 The ^European War 

ment, a basis for discussion. The German 
Government felt great embarrassment in 
doing this, feeling that it might irritate the 
Austro-Hungarian Government, but yielded 
to the British request. 

That the German Government was correct 
in this forecast was immediately shown by 
the answer of the Austro-Hungarian Govern- 
ment to the proposition, namely, that it was 
too late for that, and by the Austro-Hun- 
garian declaration of war on Servia. (No. 
^ ^,) Evidently the German Government 
was diplomatically correct in its desire to 
treat the Austro-Hungarian-Servian question 
as a matter between those two states alone, 
and that in yielding to the persuasions of Sir 
Edward Grey to step in, where neither it nor 
any other government had any right to inter- 
fere, had come dangerously near to getting a 
snub from its only ally. 

The position of the German Government 
was now most embarrassing. It had no such 
influence over the actions of Austria-Hungary 
as has been ascribed to it by the all-wise 



The Occasions of the War 27 

newspaper editors. Austria-Hungary is the 
proudest state on the European Continent 
and one of the oldest. Its imperial-royal 
house wore the crown of Charlemagne for 
500 years, and, in its view, the German 
Empire is a newcomer. Its diplomatists are 
among the most skilled and accomplished 
statesmen of Europe. Of course, they were 
justly offended at Russia's assuming to forbid 
Austria-Hungary from securing such satisfac- 
tion for her grievances against Servia as she 
considered necessary to her honor and safety. 
Of course, they knew that Great Britain was 
acting with duplicity in pretending to hold to 
the correct attitude of non-interference for 
herself and at the same time encouraging 
Servia to resist and Russia to interfere. And 
of course, they felt that their German ally 
should not yield to either Great Britain or 
Russia or both in giving any countenance to 
such a departure from correct and usual 
diplomacy. 

Sazonof and Grey knew these things, too, 
but, instead of giving due weight to the 



28 The European War 

embarrassment of the German Government, 
they undertook to make it the scapegoat in 
their work of developing, through these inci- 
dents, the Entente into a Military Alliance. 
They not only cared nothing for the embar- 
rassment they were creating for Germany in 
declaring that Germany's control over Aus- 
tria-Hungary was the key to the situation, 
but it was with them a new point gained to 
increase, at every turn and move, that embar- 
rassment in order to alienate, if possible, 
Austria-Hungary from Germany. That this 
embarrassment was clearly understood by the 
British Government is to be surely concluded 
from the dispatch received July 29 by Sir 
Edward Grey from the British Ambassador 
in Berlin. It reads: 

I found Secretary of State very depressed today. 
He reminded me that he had told me the other day 
that he had to be very careful in giving advice to 
Austria, as any idea that they were being pressed 
would be likely to cause them to precipitate matters 
and present a fait accompli. This had in fact now 
happened, and he was not sure that his communica- 
tion of your suggestion that Servians reply offered a 



The Occasions of the War 29 

basis for discussion had not hastened the declaration. 
(No. 76,) 

(Fourth.) Did Sir Edward Grey attempt 
to make it appear that Germany was respon- 
sible for the failure to bring about arbitration 
of the question between Russia and Austria- 
Hungary without explaining that this was 
really arbitration of the unarbitrable question 
between Austria-Hungary and Serviaf 

On July 29, he telegraphed to the British 
Ambassador in Rome that he had anticipated 
the German objections to mediation by the 
powers by asking the German Government 
to suggest any form of procedure under 
which It might be applied. (No. g2.) He 
claimed that the German Government had 
accepted the proposition for such Interfer- 
ence by the powers In principle, although the 
German Government had expressed great 
misgivings about the interference of the pow- 
ers in such a question and had suggested 
direct communication between Russia and 
Austria-Hungary as the proper mode of 
dealing with It. — (No. 4^-) 



30 The European War 

The trouble was that the German Govern- 
ment regarded Sir Edward Grey's proposi- 
tion for mediation as being practically arbi- 
tration, and had held from the first, quite 
correctly, that the question between Russia 
and Austria-Hungary was in substance the 
question between Austria-Hungary and Ser- 
via and was not arbitrable. While Sir 
Edward Grey sought to give another mean- 
ing to his proposed mediation, he still made 
no distinction between questions which might 
be properly brought under it and those which 
might not, which was the point of embar- 
rassment for the German Government. The 
world, however, can, he knew, be relied on 
to take things more in the rough and to 
regard objection to mediation as evidence of 
desire for war. The British White Paper 
evidently encourages this view. — (No, 8^.) 

(Fifth.) Did Sir Edward Grey do any- 
thing to restrain Russian mobilization? 

On July 29, he received official notice from 
the British Ambassador in Berlin that Russia 
was mobilizing her forces against Austria- 



The Occasions of the War 31 

Hungary. (No. 'j6.) Also from the Rus- 
sian Ambassador In London. (No, yo.) 
On the same day, he gave the German Am- 
bassador In London to understand that Great f 
Britain would not attempt to exert any Influ- 
ence upon Russia to stand aside In the ques- 
tion between Austria-Hungary and Servia 
and allow those two states to settle It them- 
selves. (No, go.) At the same time he 
indicated to the Austrian Ambassador In 
London that he regarded Russia as having 
some particular interest in Servia. — (No, 

9'-) 

On July 31, he received from the British 

Ambassadors In Berlin and St. Petersburg 
notice that Russia was mobilizing on the Ger- 
man frontier, at the very moment when, on 
request of the Czar, the Emperor was 
attempting to secure an understanding be- 
tween Russia and Austria-Hungary. (Nos, 
108 and US') And on the same day he 
instructed the British Ambassador In St. 
Petersburg that the German Ambassador In 
London had asked him " to urge the Russian 



32 The European War 

Government to show good will in the dis- 
cussions and to suspend their military prepa- 
rations," and that he had said to the Am- 
bassador that he " did not see how Russia 
could be urged to suspend them unless some 
limit were put by Austria to the advance of 
her troops into Servia." (No. no.) On the 
same day he received the thanks of the Rus- 
sian Minister of Foreign Affairs for his atti- 
tude. — (No. 120.) 

(Sixth.) Did Sir Edward Grey encourage 
France to sustain Russia? 

On July 29, he informed the British 
Ambassador in Paris that he had told Cam- 
bon, the French Ambassador in London, that 
so long as the question was one between 
Russia and Austria-Hungary, Great Britain 
would not feel called upon to take a hand in 
it, but if Germany became involved and 
France became involved, then Great Britain 
would have to consider, and that the French 
Ambassador had indicated that this was sat- 
isfactory, since if Germany attacked Russia, 
France was bound to help Russia. (No, 



The Occasions of the War 33 

8y.) Both of these men knew, of course, 
that if Russia attacked Austria-Hungary, 
Germany was bound, under the provisions of 
the Triple Alliance, to go to the aid of 
Austria-Hungary. This would not In reason 
be an attack by Germany on Russia, but 
France was determined to so regard It. In 
fact. Grey and Cambon had arranged for 
such a situation two years before. — (No, 

105') 

Sir Edward Grey also informed the British 
Ambassador In Paris in this dispatch that he 
was on the point of Informing the German 
Ambassador In London that Germany must 
not presume upon the neutrality of Great 
Britain. He also referred to the fact that 
the British fleet, which had some time before 
been concentrated In the Channel, ostensibly 
for a review, had not been dispersed, in other 
words that the British fleet was mobilized. 
This was all intended, of course, for the 
French Government and could not have 
failed to assure France that If, in a war 
between Russia and Germany, France should 



34 The European War 

take up arms in support of Russia, Great 
Britain would take up arms in support of 
France. 

When, therefore, Germany asked France 
if she would remain neutral in a war between 
Russia and Germany, France replied that 
she would consult her own interests. 

On August 2, Sir Edward Grey received 
from the British Ambassador in Berlin infor- 
mation that he, the Ambassador, had just 
been informed by the German Secretary of 
Foreign Affairs that owing to the fact that 
Russian troops had crossed the German 
frontier, Germany and Russia were in a state 
of war. (No. 144.) And on the same day 
he, Sir Edward Grey, handed the French 
Ambassador in London a memorandum 
which read: *' I am authorized to give an 
assurance that if the German fleet comes into 
the Channel or through the North Sea to 
undertake hostile operations against French 
coasts or shipping, the British fleet will give 
all the protection in its power.'' (No. 148.) 
Everything was now prepared for Great 



The Occasions of the War 35 

Britain to join with France and Russia, and 
the final task of Sir Edward Grey was to find 
the issue under which to bring this about. 

(Seventh and Eighth.) Did Sir Edward 
Grey refuse all understanding with Germany ^ 
and finally effect the participation of Great 
Britain in the war under a feigned issue f 

What that issue was to be is first indicated 
in the White Paper. (No. loi, dated July 
30.) It is a dispatch sent by Sir Edward 
Grey to the British Ambassador in Berlin for 
communication, of course, to the German 
Government. The tone of it is altogether 
different from the usually quiet manner of 
this gentleman. It is excited and extrava- 
gant and recriminatory. It is the tone of a 
man who is conscious of the weakness of his 
position and is seeking to strengthen it by 
magnifying some apparently vulnerable 
point in the position of his adversary with 
the intent to put his adversary in a false 
position. 

In this dispatch he virtually accuses the 
German Chancellor of trying to strike a bar- 



36 The European War 

gain with Great Britain whereby Great 
Britain should remain neutral while Ger- 
many should violate the neutrality of Bel- 
gium. This dispatch was an answer to one 
he had received from his Ambassador in Ber- 
lin on the preceding day informing him that 
the German Chancellor was most desirous 
to remain on friendly terms with Great 
Britain and was ready, in case Great Britain 
would remain neutral, in the event of war 
between Germany and France, to give Ger- 
many's pledge not to take any French terri- 
tory in Europe. The only thing said about 
the neutrality of Belgium by the Chancellor 
was that it would depend "upon the action 
of France what operations Germany might 
be forced to enter upon in Belgium." 

When this heated communication from Sir 
Edward Grey was conveyed to the Chancel- 
lor, he was occupied with the menacing posi- 
tion of Russia on the eastern frontier and 
he merely asked the British Ambassador to 
leave the message with him for reflection be- 
fore answer. — (No. log.) 



The Occasions of the War 37 

Sir Edward Grey now put the question to 
both the German and the French Govern- 
ment whether they were prepared to give 
assurances of respecting the neutrality of 
Belgium. (No. iiS-) It Is to be presumed 
that Sir Edward Grey meant the neutrality 
of Belgium as guaranteed by the Treaty of 
1839. This Treaty was signed by Great 
Britain, France, Austria, Russia, and Prussia. 
It had never been signed nor ratified by the 
present German Empire. Did the German 
Empire, originating thirty-two years after 
the signing of this Treaty and composed of 
twenty-four other states besides Prussia, in- 
herit the obligations of Prussia? If so, had 
Belgium herself done anything or agreed to 
anything before August i, 19 14, which could 
be regarded as Imparity of treatment by her 
of her guarantors and thus absolving the 
prejudiced guarantor from his obligations? I 
will not undertake to answer these questions, 
although I know the German Government 
claimed that she had. (No. 122.) I raise 
them only to show that Germany and France 



38 The ^European War 

did not stand in the same position over 
against this question put to them by Great 
Britain. 

Moreover, as against France, Great 
Britain could only be neutral or an ally. 
As against Germany, on the other hand, 
Great Britain could only be neutral or an 
enemy. The French Government could, 
therefore, answer at once and in the affirma- 
tive without endangering its own interests. 
The German Government, on the other 
hand, felt obliged to assure itself of the neu- 
trality of Great Britain before giving any 
pledge in regard to Belgium. 

On August I, the German Ambassador 
in London asked Sir Edward Grey, whether, 
if Germany promised not to invade Belgium, 
Great Britain would engage to remain neu- 
tral, and Sir Edward Grey answered that 
he could not say that. The Ambassador 
then pressed Sir Edward Grey to formulate 
conditions upon which Great Britain would 
remain neutral and suggested the willingness 
of Germany even to guarantee the integrity 



The Occasions of the War 39 

of France and the French colonies on condi- 
tion of the neutrality of Great Britain, and 
Sir Edward Grey refused to promise neu- 
trality upon any terms, even of his own 
making, and declared his refusal to be defin- 
itive. — (No, 123.) 

The German Empire here virtually pro- 
posed the same arrangement in regard to Bel- 
gium as that entered into by Great Britain 
and the North German Union and Great 
Britain and France in 1870, namely, that 
Great Britain should, in a war between Ger- 
many and France, remain neutral and with 
Germany guarantee Belgium against in- 
vasion by France, and with France guarantee 
Belgium against invasion by Germany, and 
Great Britain refused. Great Britain thus 
indicated to Germany that she had deter- 
mined to become a belligerent enemy to Ger- 
many in the impending war and would not 
agree to remain neutral under any condi- 
tions proposed by Germany or formulated 
by herself. 

On the next day, August 2, Sir Edward 



40 The European War 

Grey, without waiting for the final answer 
of the German Government to his demand 
that Germany should, without regard to the 
attitude of Great Britain, promise not to 
invade Belgium, gave, as we have already 
seen, assurance to France that Great Britain 
would participate In the Impending conflict as 
the ally of France. (No. 148.) With this, 
Germany was finally made to realize that the 
three great powers, commanding half the 
world in area and population, were resolved 
to make war upon her. In fact were already 
at war with her, and that her only chance 
was to strike quick and hard and where the 
danger was most immediate. 

Now this is how I read the British White 
Paper. It Is the way that one hundred and 
fifty millions of people In Europe read It, 
not only Germans and Austrlans, but Swiss, 
Dutch, Danes, Scandinavians, and some Eng- 
lishmen, and it is the way that twenty-five 
millions of people in this country read it. 
I believe it is the way every unprejudiced 
historian and diplomatist will read it twenty- 



The Occasions of the War 41 

five years from today. And It shows one of 
two things, namely: that Sir Edward Grey 
consciously intended to bring about this war, 
at this time, from the moment that he en- 
couraged Servia to resist Austria-Hungary 
and encouraged Russia to assert a protec- 
torate over Servia, or that he is a dullard 
and was an unwitting tool in the hands of 
the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, 
Sazonof. 

I would rather think the latter, but in the 
way of this stands his war speech in Par- 
liament on August 3. It must be remembered 
that at the time this speech was made the 
telegrams and dispatches contained in the 
later-published White Paper, which we have 
been citing, were known only to the British 
Cabinet. Parliament and the people of 
Great Britain had no knowledge of them 
until several days later. 

In this war speech. Sir Edward Grey sup- 
pressed the propositions contained in No. 
123 of the British White Paper and in the 
Emperor's telegram to King George of Au- 



42 The European War 

gust I, in which Germany went the whole 
length of virtually offering to agree not to 
go to war with France at all, provided only 
Great Britain would remain neutral and 
guarantee that France would do likewise; 
or, in case Great Britain could not restrain 
France, not to invade Belgium and not to 
make conquest of any French territory, Euro- 
pean or colonial, provided only great Brit- 
ain would herself remain neutral. 

The fact that Sir Edward Grey did this 
most reprehensible thing, and, at the most 
critical moment, left the impression upon the 
mind of Parliament and the people that the 
German Government had made no reply to 
the British demands about Belgian neutral- 
ity, indicate that he was playing the g^me 
of war-maker and not peace-maker. The 
war was already an established fact as be- 
tween Russia and Germany, and he seems to 
have been determined not to allow Germany 
to escape from the mortal peril of war on 
her western as well as her eastern boundary 
at the same time. In other words, he seems 



The Occasions of the War 43 

consciously to have seized this promising op- 
portunity for forcing Germany to solve her 
problems with the different states of Europe 
all at once and against their combined power. 
Even Englishmen doubt whether the 
British Cabinet could have brought the Par- 
liament and the people to the approval of 
its war policy without that bit of deception 
practiced on them by the Foreign Minister 
in that speech of August 3. Three mem- 
bers of the Cabinet, the most honest and gen- 
uinely patriotic men In it, Morley, Burns, 
and Trevelyan, left the Cabinet rather than 
to be participant In this policy; J. Ramsey 
MacDonald, member of Parliament, de- 
nounced Sir Edward Grey In unsparing 
terms for his dislngenuousness ; Arthur Pon- 
sonby pointedly asked the question In an 
article In the London Nation: "Did the 
Prime Minister In referring to what he 
called the Infamous proposal at the same time 
draw attention to the German Ambassador's 
request, at a later date^ that we should for- 
mulate the conditions on which we would re- 



44 The European War 

main neutral?" and answered it "no," and 
C. H. Norman declared that "Sir Edward 
Grey laid a snare for the House of Com- 
mons, out of which, in the excited condition 
of public opinion, the House could not be 
extricated with honor and dignity." 

Moreover, Sir Edward Grey declared in 
this same speech of August 3, that the British 
fleet was already mobilized and that the army 
was mobilizing, that the forces of the Crown 
were ready and that, in the opinion of the 
Prime Minister and the First Lord of the 
Admiralty, there was never a time when 
those forces were in a higher state of readi- 
ness and efficiency than at that moment. 
With regret I am compelled to say that 
through his own utterances. Sir Edward 
Grey seems to me to convict himself of hav- 
ing consciously followed a course of conduct 
leading directly to universal war. 

Let us now turn to the causes of the war 
and examine if they do not sustain this inter- 
pretation of the British White Paper. 



CHAPTER II 

THE PROXIMATE CAUSES OF THE WAR 

Tj^OR a correct and exhaustive understand- 
ing of these we must go back at least 
to the formation of the present German Em- 
pire. After the disrupture of the German 
Confederation in the year 1866, by the with- 
drawal or expulsion of Austria from this con- 
nection, the French Empire became the lead- 
ing state of Continental Europe, at least west 
of Russia. 

According to the well established principles 
of British diplomacy, France was then the 
state whose wings must be clipped and it was 
Great Britain's problem to find " some 
George who would do it." This was not 
difficult. The formation of the North Ger- 
man Union in 1867, embracing all of the 
German States north of the Main, and of 
the German Zollverein, including all the 

45 



46 The European War 

members of the old German Confederation, 
except Austria, excited the apprehension of 
France for her leadership in Continental 
Europe. 

France sought an opportunity for war with 
the North German Union In the year 1870 
and found It In the Spanish question. We 
must not, however, delude ourselves with the 
idea that this question caused the Franco- 
Prussian War of 1870-71. The cause of that 
war was the determination of France not 
to allow the North German Union to grow 
into the present German Empire. The 
Spanish question was only the pretext. 

What attitude would now the other powers 
of Europe assume towards the conflict? 
Russia had not forgiven France for the de- 
feat In the Crimean War of 1853-56. She, 
therefore, remained neutral. Italy was still 
mourning over the loss of Savoy and Nice, 
which she had been obliged to transfer to 
France for Napoleon's aid in her supreme 
effort for the expulsion of the Austrlans in 
1859, was also still suspicious of the plans 



The Proximate Causes 47 

of France for gaining a further foothold in 
her borders, and was resentful at the main- 
tenance of the French garrison for uphold- 
ing the Pope's supremacy in Rome. This 
was a sufficient balance to the gratitude of 
Italy towards France for the latter's assist- 
ance in 1859 to keep Italy quiet in 1870. 
Austria was still smarting under the de- 
feat of 1866, but her partner in the dual 
monarchy, Hungary, had profited by it, and 
whatever intentions hostile to the North Ger- 
man Union Austria may have entertained 
were suppressed by the rapid and decided 
victories of the North German arms. 

Lastly, Great Britain saw, at that moment, 
in the French Empire her only possible rival 
on the sea and had not forgotten the long 
struggle with France for the mastery of the 
sea. The growth of Germany as a Conti- 
nental power merely did not seem to threaten 
her interests, but rather to be a protection 
to her against French colonial aspirations. 
The one point necessary to her traditional 
policy was to prevent the coast of the Chan- 



48 The European War 

nel from Dunkirk to Antwerp from falling 
into the hands of either party, that is, to 
maintain the independence of Belgium. Na- 
poleon had already revealed intentions upon 
Belgium, and although the Treaty of 1839 
guaranteeing the neutrality of Belgium and 
signed by Great Britain, France, and Prussia, 
as well as Russia and Austria, had never 
been formally repealed, yet Great Britain 
deemed it necessary, for the safe-guarding 
of her own interests more than those of Bel- 
gium, and for their safe-guarding rather 
against France than against the North Ger- 
man Union, to exact from France and the 
North German Union separate but identical 
treaties with her, guaranteeing during the 
period of the impending war and for a year 
following its close the neutrality of Belgium. 
Under these treaties she was willing to re- 
main neutral and let the war take its course. 
While the triumph of the German arms 
and the organization of the German Empire 
by the union of the South German States 
with the North German Federation did not 



The Proximate Causes 49 

seem to give the British Statesmen much 
concern, the annexation of Alsace-Lorraine 
seemed to require some explanation in order 
to give assurance that this was not the first 
step in a policy of conquest to be followed 
by the new German Empire. It was of 
course easy to show historically that Ger- 
many was only reclaiming her own, but the 
more convincing justification was that the 
mountain range on the west side of this ter- 
ritory was the natural military boundary on 
the southwest between Germany and France, 
and that its possession by France was a con- 
stant menace to German unity and safety. 
This was Germany's chief ground, and it 
was satisfactory to Europe generally, except 
to France herself. To France it was the 
symbol of her reduction from the first to the 
second place among the states of Continental 
Europe west of Russia. The determination 
of France to regain her leadership made 
itself concrete in the Alsace-Lorraine cult 
and indicated thus to the slfewd diplomats 
of Europe what note to strike in dealing with 



50 The European War 

France in order to charm and seduce her 
to their purpose. 

The new Empire was conscious at first of 
danger chiefly, if not wholly, from France, 
and shaped its policy and diplomacy to meet 
it. It built the University at Strasburg, in- 
troduced compulsory education for stamping 
out the general illiteracy of the people in the 
annexed territory, established sanitary re- 
forms therein, improving the housing of the 
residents of the towns and villages and clear- 
ing away slums and the proletariat of which 
they were the haunts, taught the peasantry 
better methods of agriculture, and promoted 
new industries in the towns for the profit and 
welfare of their inhabitants. Anyone who 
knew by personal observation, as I did, the 
Alsace-Lorraine of 1871 and the Elsass- 
Lothringen of forty years later, could not 
help feeling astonishment and admiration 
for the vast improvement of the people in 
education, health, vigor, industry, enterprise, 
and prosperity, within this period. 

At the same time that the new Empire 



The Proximate Causes 51 

began inaugurating these reforms for the 
well-being of Elsass-Lothringen, it effected 
diplomatically an understanding with Russia 
and Austria-Hungary, in what was called 
the "Three Emperor Alliance" of 1872, for 
maintaining the peace of Europe. As a 
young student in the University of Berlin, 
I witnessed the meeting of the three Em- 
perors, William I, Alexander II, and Francis 
Joseph in the Lustgarten at the head of the 
Linden between the Palace of Frederick the 
Great and the Museum, and remember dis- 
tinctly the high hopes for permanent peace, 
contentment, and prosperity in Europe which 
were expressed in connection therewith. 
But, alas, in less than five years from that 
promising September day, Russia blasted the 
hopes which she had helped to raise by en- 
tering upon the campaign for the harvesting 
of the fatal legacy bequeathed by Peter the 
Great to his successors, the policy of the con- 
quest of Constantinople. The Powers stood 
quietly by and saw her march her armies 
almost to the gates of the City and dictate 



52 The European War 

to the humbled Turks the Treaty of San 
Stefano. Then they interfered, In the in- 
terest of Europe, against this unconscionable 
aggression, and required Russia to lay the 
Treaty for revision before the powers gath- 
ered In Congress at Berlin. That Congress 
was dominated by the British Premier, Lord 
Beaconsfield, and the German Chancellor, 
Prince Bismarck, and It ameliorated the hard 
terms of the Treaty and saved the Ottoman 
Empire from destruction. 

From that moment Russia began to change 
her feeling and policy towards the German 
Empire and to cultivate a rapprochement 
with France. The astute Bismarck perceived 
the change and worked with all his might 
to check It. He did finally. In the year 1884, 
succeed In Inducing Russia to enter with Ger- 
many Into a neutrality agreement for a few 
years In case either should be attacked by 
a third power. When this period expired 
Russia turned away from all agreements 
with Germany and gravitated towards 
France. 



The Proximate Causes 53 

So soon as Bismarck became aware of 
Russia's displeasure In 1879, he had turned 
to Austria-Hungary and had formed with 
the Hapsburg Empire a defensive alliance 
directed chiefly against Russian attack. Four 
years later, In 1883 — some writers place it a 
little earlier — when the approach of Russia 
to France had become clearly manifest, Italy 
joined this Alliance, called thereafter the 
Triple Alliance, which was now directed 
against an attack upon either member of 
the Alliance by either Russia or France. 

The keynote of Bismarck's policy was the 
consolidation of the German Empire as a 
Continental European state and the pur- 
suance of a world policy, that is a policy of 
colonial expansion and foreign trade, only 
in so far as It did not endanger the Conti- 
nental position and interests of the Empire. 
From the location of the Empire In the 
middle of Europe, surrounded by powerful 
states already regarding it with dislike, this 
was most necessary. Under such conditions 
it was most difficult to adjust properly the 



54 The European War 

elements of such a policy. Already by 1890 
Germany had emerged from the stage of 
an agricultural community and was fast be- 
coming a great manufacturing and commer- 
cial state. This had been made necessary 
by the rapid increase of her population, 
which could with difficulty be supported by 
agriculture alone upon her two hundred and 
eight thousand square miles of territory. But 
this change required foreign markets, and 
Spain, France, Holland, and lastly Great 
Britain had taught the world that the way 
to get and preserve these was by the estab- 
lishment of colonies. 

There is no doubt that it was with consid- 
erable apprehension that Bismarck brought 
himself to take over some unclaimed African 
territory and begin the establishment of a 
German colony. He soon experienced the 
jealous watchfulness of Great Britain, but 
for this once he turned it to advantage in 
yielding to British demands in South Africa, 
acquiring as compensation for Germany the 
island of Helgoland. This was accomplished 



The Proximate Causes 55 



in the year of his retirement from office, 
1890, in fact under his successor, and it cor- 
responded with his policy of looking out first 
for the interests of the Empire at home. 
It was also a point gained that Great Britain 
was induced to recognize that Germany had 
any right to appear outside of her Conti- 
nental boundaries. 

Whether the approach of France and 
Russia was facilitated by this event or not 
we do not surely know, but we do know that 
in 1894, the understanding between them 
had ripened into a treaty, the contents of 
which were kept secret, but which we must 
now conclude pledged the two, at an opor- 
tune moment, to make war upon Germany. 

Germany understood the danger and 
sought to avert it by encouraging Russia to 
pursue her policy of expansion in Asia, hop- 
ing thus to deliver Europe from her en- 
croachments. Germany, therefore, supported 
Russia in the year 1895 against Japan in 
Russia's effort to keep Japan from the Pa- 
cific coast at the points where Russia might 



56 The European War 

find an ice-free port for the Pacific terminus 
of her Siberian Railway. This irritated 
Japan against Germany and the vindictive 
little yellow man watched patiently for his 
opportunity to revenge himself, which has 
at last come. In 1898 Germany leased from 
China some two hundred square miles of 
territory, the port of Kiau-chau and placed 
thus a pawn in the reach of Japan. At the 
same time Russia leased Port Arthur at the 
head of the Liao-tung peninsula from China 
and created thus a point of friction between 
herself and Japan. 

From 1890 to 1898, Germany, all the time 
in rapid development as a great manufactur- 
ing and commercial state, had acquired not 
over two thousand square miles of territory 
for colonial purposes, and the most of this 
was not intended for colonization but simply 
for coaling and supply stations, while Great 
Britain, France, and Russia were seizing 
hundreds and hundreds of thousands of 
square miles of territory by military force 
all over the world. Germany had already 



The Proximate Causes 57 

begun to learn, thus, that foreign trade might 
exist without colonies, in fact was more 
profitable without them, if only the doors of 
all countries should be made open and kept 
open. 

For some time Germany had been looking 
upon the Turkish Empire in Asia as a new 
and profitable region for trade, and in the 
year 1898 the German Emperor made his 
famous visit to Constantinople, Damascus, 
and Jerusalem, and in the year 1900 a Ger- 
man company or syndicate received a con- 
cession from the Turkish Government to 
build and operate a railroad from Con- 
stantinople through the middle of the 
Turkish Empire in Asia to the Persian Gulf. 
In the same year, 1900, the Navy Bill for 
the systematic and continuous development 
of the German Navy was passed by the Im- 
perial Parliament and became law. 

The German idea was that, instead of fol- 
lowing any further the expensive and destruc- 
tive and immoral policy of dismembering 
the Turkish Empire, it would be more eco- 



^8 The European War 

nomlcal, constructive, and humane to main- 
tain its integrity, and to seek its regeneration 
by bringing it into closer contact wtih Europe 
and the world, through active trade, com- 
merce, and communication. The German 
idea was prompted not only by the desire 
to extend German trade, not only by the 
desire to help on the development of the 
inhabitants of the Turkish Empire, and not 
only by the conviction that the Turks were 
the best fitted among all the races of the 
Empire to govern, but also by the desire of 
removing the Turkish question, that is, the 
question of the partition of Turkey, as the 
great disturbing factor of European peace, 
from the arena of European politics; while 
the purpose of the development of the fleet 
was to be able to protect the rapidly growing 
German merchant marine and commerce 
against all possible attack and unlawful 
interference. 

Great Britain, on the other hand, evidently 
did not understand the German idea or did 
not trust the German intentions. Her states- 



The Proximate Causes 59 

men appeared to apprehend that the inten- 
tions of Germany were territorial acquisitions 
in the Turkish Empire and naval hostility 
to Great Britain. Great Britain had prac- 
ticed the policy of territorial aggrandizement 
so long as the solution of the commercial 
question that it was very difficult for her to 
understand that there could be any other 
solution. 

At the same time the Russian activity in 
Asia was giving Great Britain great concern 
about her possessions and position upon that 
vast continent, and the support of Germany 
to Russia in keeping Japan out of the Liao- 
tung peninsula suggested to the British dip- 
lomatists the existence of some more friendly 
relations between Russia and Germany than 
they had before this supposed. 

After the accession of King Edward in 
1 90 1 — I will not venture to say in conse- 
quence of it — the diplomacy of Great Britain 
towards Russia and Germany seems to have 
been based on those suspicions. An under- 
standing between Russia, Germany, and 



6o The European War 

Turkey in the Asiatic question could to the 
British mind mean just one thing, namely, 
the shunting of Russia away from Con- 
stantinople and from the bay of Alexan- 
dretta and her advance from the Trans- 
Caucasus through Persia to the Persian 
Gulf. Here Russia would at last reach the 
open sea and have an ice-free port. But 
she would then flank India. This mortal 
danger to the British Empire must, at any 
cost, be averted. It is to this task that the 
British diplomacy of the years between 1901 
and 19 14 has addressed itself. 

Judging from the conversations in the po- 
litical centres of Europe, from occasional 
statements coming from highly informed and 
responsible sources, and from the course of 
events during that period, the plan of the 
British Government then formed and now 
pursued by force of arms is the acquisition 
of the vast territory lying between Egypt 
and the Levant on the west and lower Persia 
on the east, the connection of the same with 
Egypt and the ports of the Levant by a 



The Proximate Causes 6l 

railroad leading from Alexandria to the 
Persian Gulf, and the establishment, prob- 
ably at Mecca or Cairo, of a new Caliphate 
of the Mohammedan believers, under the 
control of the British government. This 
would defend the British possession of India 
In two ways, namely, from territorial aggres- 
sion by Russia, possibly supported or coun- 
tenanced by Germany, and from the spiritual 
power of the Turkish Sultan as Caliph of 
all Mohammedan believers, and It might 
open the way some day for the acquisition 
of all Mohammedan North Africa by the 
British Empire. 

Now how could such a gigantic plan be 
realized? Naturally the first and entirely 
indispensable step must be the turning of the 
supposed new friendship between Russia and 
Germany into hostility, and the weakening 
of both Russia and Germany. Let us see 
whether this was the course which Great 
Britain pursued. It has been recently as- 
serted by persons closely connected with the 
German Government that In 1902 Great 



62 The European War 

Britain offered Germany an alliance with 
herself and Japan, the point of which was 
directed against Russia, and that Germany 
declined it. Japan, on the other hand, en- 
tered into it and in less than two years began 
the war upon Russia with the purpose of 
driving Russia back from her outlet upon 
the Pacific at Port Arthur and in Manchuria. 
In this she was successful and the results 
were most advantageous to Great Britain. 
Russia, weakened by defeat and revolution, 
was driven back upon Europe, that is upon 
Germany and Austria-Hungary, and ren- 
dered incapable of pursuing her policy of 
expansion in Asia, and Germany and Austria- 
Hungary were compelled to face the prob- 
ability of Russia's resuming her traditional 
policy of seizing Constantinople. 

This first and most important step in the 
realization of the British plan for connecting 
Egypt and India having been thus success- 
fully taken, the British diplomatists could 
now advance to the second. This second step 
was to remove the participation of France in 



The Proximate Causes 63 

the administration of Egypt, leaving Great 
Britain thus the sole power therein, subject 
of course, for the moment, to the nominal 
sovereignty of the Turkish Sultan, and at 
the same time to gain the support of France 
for the acquisition of the territory between 
Egypt and Persia. The opportunity for this 
came at the very moment of Russia's defeat 
by Japan. 

France had been for several years ma- 
neuvering and intriguing with Spain for the 
seizure and partition of Morocco. When 
Great Britain became aware of these move- 
ments in 1904, perhaps earlier, she mani- 
fested opposition, of course, but immediately 
improved the opportunity for getting rid of 
the French right of participation in admin- 
istering the finances of Egypt, and for 
getting the consent of France for the acquisi- 
tion of the vast territory between Egypt and 
Persia, by agreeing to the French occupation 
of Morocco. But Germany now stepped in 
and demanded the submission of the Mo- 
rocco question to a Congress of the Powers. 



64 The European War 

France regarded this as very impertinent on 
the part of Germany and her spirit of re- 
venge for 1870 received a new Incitement. 
Nevertheless Germany Insisted and the Con- 
gress of the Nations at Algeclras was as- 
sembled In 1906. This Congress ordained 
the Independence and Integrity of Morocco, 
under her own Sultan, accorded certain very 
limited police powers to France, Spain, and 
Switzerland therein, and decreed the open 
door for the trade of all the nations there- 
with. We shall see a little further on how 
France disregarded these provisions of the 
Algeclras Convention, and how Great Britain 
protected her disregard of the pact. 

With Russia weakened by defeat and revo- 
lution, with her French ally dependent upon 
British support in Africa, and with Germany 
again apprehensive of the revival of Russia's 
designs upon Constantinople, Great Britain 
was now, as third step in the realization of 
her plan, able to bring Russia to the Persian 
Agreement of 1907, according to which 
Russia recognized the southern half of 



The Proximate Causes 65 

Persia as belonging to the sphere of British 
influence, as they call it, which is nothing 
more nor less than the preliminary to annexa- 
tion. With this Russia gave up the route to 
the open sea on the south through Persia 
and the Persian Gulf. This she certainly 
would never have done had not advantage 
been taken of her extreme exhaustion, be- 
cause this is the only route by which she 
can immediately reach the open sea on the 
south. The other routes lead only to the 
Mediterranean, and Great Britain guards 
both outlets of this lake into the open sea. 
Moreover, it was to be surmised that 
Great Britain would oppose the passage of 
Russia from the Trans-Caucasus over 
Armenia to the harbor of Alexandretta in 
the northeast corner of the Mediterranean. 
Russia once in possession of the plateau of 
Armenia would not only command all of the 
routes from Asia into Asia Minor, but could 
occupy at pleasure the entire valley of the 
Euphrates and the Tigris down to the Per- 
sian Gulf. This would conflict with the 



66 The European War 

British plan for annexing Mesopotamia to 
Egypt, and would bring the two great land- 
grabbing Empires of the world face to face 
across the Imaginary line of the surveyor. 
^^^ Great Britain would certainly prefer the 
Turk to the Russian for her neighbor. She 
would certainly prefer to have Russia take 
Constantinople than Armenia and Alexan- 
dretta. In fact after the agreement of 1907, 
and by it, Russia was brought back to the 
conviction that her aspiration to reach the 
sea on the south was, as to Its probable ful- 
fillment, confined to the route through Con- 
stantinople. But from the moment of the 
conclusion of that Treaty of 1907, the route 
to Constantinople, lay, as the Russians now 
say, through Berlin. In other words, the 
plan of Great Britain for the annexation of 
Southeastern Turkey and Arabia to Egypt, 
the Treaty of 1907 with Russia as to 
Southern Persia, the German Bagdad Rail- 
road, and the alliance of France with 
Russia and Great Britain, left, of all the 
great powers, united for the defense of the 



The Proximate Causes 67 

integrity of the Ottoman Empire in the Con- 
gress of 1878 at Berlin, only Germany and 
Austria-Hungary, and ranged Great Britain 
with her old foe in this question, Russia, with 
whom she is now endeavoring to destroy and 
despoil the Ottoman Empire, at the same 
time that she holds the island of Cyprus in 
trust as a basis of operations for her pledged 
defense, especially against Russia, of the in- 
tegrity of that Empire. 

The plans were fast ripening for the blow. 
In June of 1908 the meeting between King 
Edward and the Czar took place on ship- 
board near Reval in the Gulf of Finland, and 
was almost immediately followed by that be- 
tween the Czar and President Fallieres of 
France at the same place. The purpose of 
these interviews, it is understood, was to 
arrange for intervention in the affairs of 
Macedonia, the burning question in the rela- 
tions between Turkey and her Balkan sub- 
jects. Of course, the Entente Powers knew 
that such intervention by them would meet 
with objection from Germany and Austria- 



68 The European War 

Hungary. Italy, the other member of the 
Triple Alliance, had apparently given ear to 
the seductions of Russia, exciting her aspira- 
tions in South Tyrol and along the Dalmatian 
Coast and influencing the feelings of the Ital- 
ian Royal House through its connection with 
the Princely House of Montenegro. Italy, 
they calculated, would at least remain neutral 
and might even be induced to abandon her 
allies and cast her lot with them. 

Then came almost like a thunderbolt out 
of clear sky the Young Turkish revolution 
in July, 1908. Its purpose was the establish- 
ment of Constitutional Government. It is 
quite evident that Great Britain was shaken 
by it more than the other members of the 
Entente. Great Britain probably supposed 
that the cordiality between Germany and 
Turkey was only a cordiality between Ger- 
many and the Government of Abdul Hamid 
and that the overthrow of this Government 
and the establishment of Constitutional Gov- 
ernment with a new Sultan or possibly Presi- 
dent would dispel it and substitute therefor a 



The Proximate Causes 69 

friendly feeling towards Great Britain as the 
Mother of Parliaments. 

Great Britain did not then understand at 
all that the cordiality between Germany and 
Turkey was based upon the conviction on the 
part of the Turkish people that Germany 
was only seeking their trade, while Great ^^c-*-^, ^ 
Britain and Russia were seeking their terri- 
tory, that it was therefore the interest and 
purpose of Germany to observe and protect 
Turkey's integrity and independence, while 
it was the interest and purpose of Great Brit- 
ain and Russia to undermine and destroy 
them. 

Whatever may have been the reason, the 
intervention in Macedonia did not come off. 
The claimed necessity for it seemed to be 
forestalled by the establishment of the new 
Constitutional Government at Constantino- 
ple, or, more truthfully said, the pretext for 
it was stripped of all show of respectability. 

But something else did happen which 
brought Europe to the very brink of war. 
Bulgaria and the Austro-Hungarian province 



yo The ^European War 

of Bosnia-Herzegovina were still subject to 
the nominal suzerainty of the Turkish Sultan. 
It was certainly a very slender tie. For 
thirty years Bulgaria had been essentially an 
independent sovereign state and for the same 
period Bosnia-Herzegovina had been admin- 
istered and developed and really redeemed 
to civilization by Austria-Hungary. The ap- 
prehension now seized upon Bulgaria and 
Austria-Hungary that the new Turkish Gov- 
ernment contemplated the restoration of its 
actual supremacy over these former Turkish 
provinces by including them in the represen- 
tation In the new Constitutional Parliament 
at Constantinople. 

Bulgaria and Austria-Hungary forestalled 
this danger on the selfsame day, October 5, 
1908, by simply repudiating the suzerainty 
of the Sultan. This suzerainty had been re- 
served by the Berlin Congressional Act of 
1878, that is, by the act of the great powers 
of Europe represented in that Congress, and 
it remained now to be seen whether they 
would intervene and uphold the suzerainty of 



The Proximate Causes 71 

the Sultan. It would have been out of all 
reason for them to have done so, and they 
did not. Austria-Hungary, however, paid the 
Porte some ten millions of dollars indemnity. 
But Servia made a great ado about it and 
was backed up by Russia. This was a reve- 
lation of the plan for holding Bosnia-Her- 
zegovina at least in this relation until Russia 
should be ready to tear it away by main force 
from Austria-Hungary, either by the right 
of might or by capturing Constantinople, suc- 
ceeding thus to the powers of the Turkish 
Government, and then reclaiming it through 
the reserved suzerainty over it. It was at 
this critical moment that Germany stepped in 
and stayed the hand of Russia and preserved 
the peace of Europe. The plan of the En- 
tente shipwrecked for this once upon the un- 
preparedness of Russia, the hesitation of 
Great Britain, and the decision and firmness 
of Germany. 

The following year King Edward passed 
away and the indecision of the British Gov- 
ernment seemed to be increased by this event. 



72 The ^European War 

This, together with the hope of at least weak- 
ening the friendship between Germany and 
Turkey, under the new regime, and several 
other things, such as the supposed friendly 
policy of the new German Chancellor, the 
influence of the German example on the new 
socialistic legislation of the British Parlia- 
ment and pre-occupatlon with the Irish ques- 
tion, seemed to modify the attitude of Great 
Britain towards Germany in the direction of 
a better understanding of Germany's pur- 
poses. Especially did Great Britain seem to 
show more comprehension of Idea that Ger- 
many's Interests and undertakings in Turkey 
were economic and commercial, while those 
of Russia were territorial and political. 

But these appearances were quickly dis- 
pelled again by the movements of France in 
Morocco. During the five years between 
1906 and 191 1, France had been continually 
doing little things In Morocco, which, by a 
fair interpretation of the Algeciras Conven- 
tion, were stretches of the powers conferred 
upon her, and doing them under pretexts 



The Proximate Causes 73 

which she herself created, as for example in 
the Casablanca affair, where the French oiB- 
cials excited the Moors by desecrating one 
of their cemeteries and then shelled the town 
from a warship in order to quell the riot. 

Finally, in 191 1, France proclaimed that 
the foreign residents of Fez were in great 
danger and sent an army of some sixteen 
thousand men to occupy the capital of Mo- 
rocco. There was nothing wrong in Fez ex- 
cept the French military occupation of it. 
That was nothing more nor less than the con- 
quest of Morocco in the face of the Algeciras 
Convention forbidding it. Spain, one of the 
signatories of it, immediately occupied a posi- 
tion on the west coast of Morocco, and Ger- 
many, another signatory, sent The Panther, 
a little warship, to another place, Agadir, 
not far away from the position of the Span- 
iards. Great Britain immediately espoused 
the French cause, although she herself was 
one of the signatories of the ruptured Algeci- 
ras Convention, and almost threatened Ger- 
many with war. The British justified them- 



74 The ^European War 

selves for this apparently strange position of 
upholding the violator of a compact, to which 
she herself was a signatory, against the pro- 
test of another signatory by representing that 
Germany was seeking at Agadir a naval base 
for interfering with the trade between Great 
Britain and South America. But this was 
only the pretext. The real reason for the 
British attitude lay a great deal deeper. It 
was to secure the compensation to France for 
the French withdrawal of rights In Egypt 
and the French approval of the British plan 
for annexing to Egypt the regions between 
Egypt and Persia. The Germans knew this 
well enough then, and there were many 
among them who thought that Germany 
should have assumed the risk of war at that 
juncture under the Issue of upholding the 
Algeclras Convention, but the Emperor 
would have none of It. His diplomatists suc- 
ceeded In settling the matter peaceably by 
accepting from France a concession which 
was barely sufficient to save Germany from 
humiliation. 



The Proximate Causes 75 

During this same time, 1911-1912, another 
significant movement was in course of accom- 
plishment further eastward. I mean the 
occupation of Tripoli by Italy. It is most 
difficult to believe that this was really sup- 
ported or desired by Italy's allies of the 
Triple Alliance and there is no evidence that 
it was. It exhausted Italy's strength at the 
same time that it exhausted Turkey's 
strength, and made Italy and Turkey ene- 
mies, all of which things were directly con- 
trary to the interests of Germany and Austria- 
Hungary, if Italy was to remain true to her 
allies. As said in the preceding chapter, I 
have it from excellent British authority that 
it was Great Britain which prompted Italy to 
this adventure, her object being to place Italy 
in a position where, in case of a war between 
the Powers of the Entente and the Powers of 
the Triple Alliance, Italy would not be able 
to discharge her duty to her allies. This is 
entirely intelligible. It is also easy to under- 
stand that Great Britain might prefer to 
have Italy as her immediate neighbor in 



76 The "European War 

North Africa rather than France. If it was 
British diplomacy which instigated this en- 
terprise, it was certainly a fine stroke, and 
the British Foreign Secretary may well be 
proud of it. Moreover, the instigation of 
the Balkan League at this same moment by 
Great Britain's ally, Russia, against Turkey 
and Austria-Hungary points to the same 
origin of Italy's Tripoli enterprise. 

The final developments of the proximate 
causes of the great catastrophe follow now 
rapidly upon each other. While France and 
Russia were organizing and financing the 
Balkan League, Great Britain seemed to 
become apprehensive of the destruction of 
Turkey and the advance of Russia to the 
Mediterranean. She seemed, for the mo- 
ment, to prefer the German commercial 
interests in Asiatic Turkey to the Russian 
territorial projects. It is claimed that some 
understanding with Germany about the Bag- 
dad railroad was in process of realization. 
Then the storm broke. The Balkan allies 
attacked Turkey first, while it is claimed by 



The Proximate Causes 77 

many well-informed persons that Russia in- 
tended them to attack Austria-Hungary first. 
During the autumn of 19 12 they were gen- 
erally victorious and drove the Turkish 
forces back to their last defensible line 
before Constantinople. 

At this moment, in the first days of 19 13, 
Russian military movements from the Trans- 
Caucasus towards Armenia were discovered. 
Both Germany and Great Britain understood 
them fully. They meant the seizure of a 
broad belt of Turkish territory extending 
through Armenia to the northeast corner of 
the Mediterranean. They meant the destruc- 
tion of the Turkish Empire in Asia, the de- 
struction of the German commercial interests 
therein, and an uncomfortable nearness of 
Russia to Egypt and the Suez Canal. In 
possession of the Armenian plateau, Russia 
would be able, according to military opinion, 
not only to reach the bay of Alexandretta, 
but to occupy at pleasure Syria, Babylonia, 
and Mesopotamia ; in other words, to defeat 
the British plan for joining Egypt with 



78 The ^European War 

Persia by the occupation of the regions lying 
between them. 

Germany again interfered at the critical 
moment and demanded the cessation of this 
movement. Great Britain felt that, for the 
moment, her own interests coincided with 
those of Germany, and Russia yielded, 
though with a very bad grace, and with in- 
creased anger against Germany. At the same 
moment the ambitions of Bulgaria ruptured 
the Balkan League and turned the war 
against Turkey into a war between the Bal- 
kan states. This saved Austria-Hungary for 
the moment from the attack which the Bal- 
kan states, following the victory over Tur- 
key, were to have made upon her. The 
European war appeared to be again averted 
and Great Britain seemed to be nearing Ger- 
many. But, alas ! it was only appearance. 

Turned back by Germany from the way 
through Armenia to the Mediterranean, Rus- 
sia became now fully determined to revert 
to the old policy of seizing Constantinople, 
and Great Britain must have become con- 



The Proximate Causes 79 

vinced that of the three ways for Russia to 
reach the sea on the south, the one through 
Constantinople would be least injurious to 
British interests. Great Britain, moreover, 
understood that Germany and Austria-Hun- 
gary would stand across this way also, and 
that even if Russia succeeded In overcoming 
their opposition she would come out of the 
struggle so exhausted that she need no longer 
be feared, and that also Germany and Aus- 
tria-Hungary would be weakened, one of the 
chief points of British diplomacy. 

Angered by the opposition of Germany to 
her plan for seizing Armenia, Russia now 
turned to her French ally and obtained from 
her the reintroductlon of the three years' 
term of active military service, raising the 
peace footing of the active army to 800,000 
or more and the promise of a new loan of 
five hundred million dollars. 

The Germans knew only too well that the 
hour was rapidly approaching, and made 
their own preparations to meet the increase 
of military strength on the part of France 



8o The European War 

and Russia. The German Government still 
hoped, however, that the danger to British 
interests involved in the threatened dissolu- 
tion of the Ottoman Empire by the Russian 
plan, either by way of Armenia or Constan- 
tinople, might deter Great Britain from be- 
coming the military ally of Russia and France 
in their attack on Germany and Austria- 
Hungary. But the German Government and 
the German people did not sufficiently appre- 
ciate Great Britain's fear of the German com- 
petition in trade and commerce and of the 
growth of the German Navy. 

The British Government must have had 
serious misgivings. The resignation of three 
members of the Cabinet is good evidence of 
that. But the majority of that body evi- 
dently reached the conclusion that, after the 
general exhaustion of the Continental Powers 
by unrelenting war, Great Britain would be 
better able to deal with Russia later on than 
she was then to cope with the rapidly devel- 
oping power and prosperity of Germany. 
And so when the Russian puppet in the Bal- 



The Proximate Causes 8 1 

kans touched the match to the train that had 
thus been laid, and Austria-Hungary sought 
to defend Its own house against the conflagra- 
tion, the British Government encouraged 
Servia to resist, encouraged Russia to inter- 
fere, encouraged France to support Russia 
and promised her own support to France. 
This is the bare and bald truth. All the rest 
is the diplomatic veil of deception. The his- 
tory of the proximate causes of the war sus- 
tains, thus, the Interpretation we have placed 
upon the British White Paper, and is recon- 
cilable with no other interpretation. 

There are, however, still deeper causes for 
this war which spring out of the irresistible 
movements and purposes of that Destiny 
which guides the world through the different 
stages of Its civilization. Let us try to get 
a glimpse of these. 



CHAPTER III 

THE UNDERLYING CAUSES OF THE WAR 

Q OME days ago I read an editorial in one 
of our leading journals in which the 
writer said that those persons who were en- 
deavoring to explain the German point of 
view of the great European movement now 
realizing itself were simply beating out their 
brains against the stone wall of American 
public opinion. It was something for this 
writer to acknowledge that they had any 
brains to beat out, and I have no doubt that 
they are all deeply grateful for the favor, for 
they have certainly learned to appreciate 
small favors. I do not know whether the 
noble writer classes me among those whose 
brains are now bespattering this adamantine 
wall, I presume he does. But there is just 
enough of them left in their original home 
to evolve this thought as the keynote of this 
chapter, namely, that there is something still 

82 



The Underlying Causes 83 

harder than this stone wall of public opinion, 
and still harder, though in a different sense, 
than the bombproof casemate cranium of the 
man who wrote that editorial. That some- 
thing is the Destiny which rules this world. 
It is the power which puts one civilization 
after another at the head of the column of 
human progress in the world-historic march 
towards universal civilization. It shall be 
our effort in this chapter to gain a point of 
observation from which we may determine 
whither this column is advancing and which 
of the Nations is, for our age, its true leader. 
I do not think it difficult for any deep 
reader of the world's history to satisfy him- 
self as to the first question. Through all 
the changes of government and empire, 
through all of the successions of peoples and 
nations to the leadership, and through all of 
the turnings and windings and zigzags of the 
course, he sees mankind ever progressing to- 
wards a more and more general distribution 
of the fruits of civilization, namely, intelli- 
gence, education, character, and wealth ; and 



84 The lEuropean War 

he sees the leadership in the march passing 
from hand to hand In accordance with the 
ability to bring about this wider and wider 
distribution from age to age. 

The second question, however, requires 
more detailed. If not more exact, examina- 
tion. Some years ago, in the company of its 
steward, I was going over one of those mag- 
nificent ducal estates in England, which ren- 
der England the most beautiful spot on earth 
to look upon. As I viewed its wonderful 
lawns and pastures and forests, an exquisite 
expanse for hunt, play, and recreation, I 
asked the steward whether the products of 
the estate supported the workers and dwell- 
ers on it, not including the Duke and his im- 
mediate family. He answered promptly, 
"No." I then asked him whence the addi- 
tional sum necessary for their support came. 
He answered as promptly that the Duke fur- 
nished it. I queried again of him as to where 
the Duke procured It, whether his other coun- 
try estates were more profitable. He replied: 
"No," that the Duke's income was from the 



The Underlying Causes 85 

rent of his houses in London. I pushed the 
investigation still further and Inquired as 
to the source of the means of the Duke's city 
tenants enabling them to pay the Duke rent. 
He explained that It was manufacture, trade, 
and commerce; and when I requested to 
know with whom this commerce and trade 
were carried on and to whom the manufac- 
tured products were sold, he answered again 
unhesitatingly: "With and to the Colonies 
as the fixed and regular course and with and 
to the rest of the world as circumstances per- 
mit." Still further, I asked of him whether 
all the landlords of England were In the same 
condition economically as the one he served, 
and his response was In the affirmative. 

From these brief but pointed replies I 
gathered that the British economic system 
consisted of the following fundamental ele- 
ments: First, an upper ten to twenty thou- 
sand — with their Immediate families we will 
call them fifty to one hundred thousand — 
owning the land, the houses, and the capital 
of the British Islands, the Landlords, the 



86 The ^European War 

Railroad Kings, the Manufacturing Lords, 
the Shipping Lords, the Great Bankers, and 
the Large Importers; second, the division of 
the land in the country into vast estates, the 
princely homes of these privileged classes, 
and used in so great measure for the grati- 
fication of the taste of the owners and for 
their sport, pleasure, and recreation, as to 
reduce the products of agriculture to about 
one-fourth of what is necessary for the feed- 
ing of the inhabitants of the Islands; third, 
the gathering of the great mass of the pop- 
ulation into cities, the centres of manufac- 
ture, trade, and commerce, resulting in over- 
crowding and the poverty, sickness, vice, and 
ignorance attendant thereon, that is. In the 
development of the slum and the proletariat; 
fourth, a vast Colonial dominion, ever in- 
creasing in extent, in which to dispose of the 
manufactured products of the Islands and 
from which to draw in exchange the agricul- 
tural products to feed them, and from which 
to draw also mining wealth, official salaries, 
and liberal interest upon loaned and invested 



The Underlying Causes 87 

capital; fifth, a vast merchant marine, suffi- 
cient in its strength to control the trade and 
commerce between the Islands and the Colo- 
nial Empire in all parts of the world, and a 
vast navy, able to sustain and protect this 
control at will by physical force. 

I communicated these thoughts substan- 
tially as here stated to my host and asked him 
whether it was a fair presentation of the 
existing British economic system. He replied 
that it was, with the modification that in prac- 
tice Great Britain permitted free trade be- 
tween her Colonies and other countries. I 
said to him that Great Britain can do that 
safely now (1887), because as a matter of 
fact she has at this time no real competitor 
in manufacture and commerce — but suppose 
some successful competitor should arise? He 
answered: "We should have to shut them 
out by law or destroy them by force." But, 
I inquired finally, would your Colonies ac- 
quiesce in a protective tariff imposed by the 
British Parliament against the rest of the 
world for the profit of the British manufac- 



88 The ^European War 

turer? And he replied : " Possibly not, and 
in that case we would have to destroy our 
competitor by physical force." 

I cannot perceive that this British eco- 
nomic system has changed substantially be- 
tween that date (1887) and the present. Be- 
tween then and now It has been obliged to 
release Ireland, in large degree, from its 
clutch, and it has introduced some features 
of the German pension and Insurance system 
for the relief of its proletariat. On the other 
hand nearly two millions of square miles 
more of the earth's surface with the people 
inhabiting the same have been brought, 
chiefly by fire and sword, within its control, 
and the development of American multl- 
millionairedom with the aspiration of the 
members of it for British titles has opened 
up, through International marriage, a new 
and productive source of contribution and 
revenue for the British nobility, tending to 
the preservation of the system. 

At the beginning of this century, Mr. 
Chamberlain and his followers made an ear- 



The Underlying Causes 89 

nest eifort to ward off the dangers to the 
system of allowing other countries to trade 
freely with the British Colonies by proposing 
the adoption of the high protective tariff 
principle, but were unable to make the Par- 
liament and the people realize the situation. 
They did not believe that any other country 
could successfully compete with British man- 
ufacture, and they shrank from the effect 
upon the Colonies of an attempt to force 
them artificially to purchase British goods. 
And so, in spite of some preferences in favor 
of the British products, the economic system 
of the Empire was on August i, 19 14, sub- 
stantially as described in general outline 
above. 

It is a general feature of political history 
that the governmental system tends to adjust 
itself to the economic. It is not difficult to 
see that such an economic system as the Brit- 
ish, having, as its keynotes, indefinite Colo- 
nial expansion and the control of the com- 
merce of the seas, would require, on the Gov- 
ernmental side, an overwhelming navy, pro- 



90 The ^European War 

fessional colonial armies, and a more and 
more unlimited Government; a Government 
which can act promptly and decisively and, 
if necessary, secretly. This is precisely the 
course taken in the recent developments of 
the British political system. 

During the last ten years, by the invention 
and construction of the dreadnaughts, the 
Navy has been made invincible and has won 
for Great Britain the sovereignty over the 
seas. At this moment no nation in the world 
and no combination of nations venture to 
dispute this or even to assert its or their 
own heretofore claimed rights thereon 
against it. At the same time the colonial 
armies have been strengthened and disci- 
plined and seasoned by action until they are 
not only capable of suppressing insurrection 
and revolt, but of extending the boundaries 
of the Colonial Empire in all parts of the 
world. 

Lastly, the British Government has grad- 
ually become a group of Ministers wielding 
the unlimited powers of the majority in an 



The Underlying Causes 91 

unlimited House of Commons. There is no 
longer a British constitution according to the 
American idea of constitutional government. 
With us constitutional government is limited 
government, government limited judicially 
by the rights of the individual, expressed and 
guaranteed by a written instrument, ordained 
by the sovereign people and interpreted and 
enforced by the courts, and limited politically 
by the constitutional distribution of powers 
between, and the coordination of, separate 
and independent departments of government. 
In this only true sense of constitutional gov- 
ernment, the British Government is a des- 
potism. There is no judicial body which 
can uphold the rights of the individual 
against an act of Parliament; in fact, against 
an act of Parliament no Individual right ex- 
ists. There is no Independent executive 
which can veto, modify, check, or delay an 
act of Parliament. And the House of Lords 
can now no longer thwart or even modify 
permanently the will of the House of Com- 
mons, wielded by the majority party in that 



92 The European War 

House, under the leadership of its Executive 
Committee, the Cabinet of Ministers. 

The Russian economic and political sys- 
tems have more points of likeness with the 
British than is usually conceived. Substitut- 
ing the Czar for the almighty House of 
Commons, and the Grand Ducal circle for 
the Cabinet, and keeping in mind that the 
connection of the dependencies with the nu- 
cleus of the Empire is territorial instead of 
oversea, and that, therefore, the necessary 
organ of military power is a vast army in- 
stead of an overwhelming navy, and you have 
in substance the elements whose play and 
interplay bring about something like the same 
results and produce something like the same 
policy as in the British system. At least we 
may say that the two are admirably adapted 
to supplement each other in the conquest of 
the world. They possess between them now 
nearly half of it, and if they can only agree 
between themselves to let the one have the 
whole of Asia and Continental Europe and 
the other all the rest, then possibly will the 



The Underlying Causes 93 

Millennium be ushered In and, with the Bear 
and the Lion In loving embrace, mankind 
may enjoy everlasting peace. 

But will the God of History, the Destiny 
which guides the world's progress, permit 
such a travesty of the world's civilization, 
such a mockery of the world's advancement, 
to accomplish Itself In the twentieth century? 
I cannot believe It. I think that this hand 
of Destiny Is preparing something better, 
In fact has prepared something better, some- 
thing which shall emerge triumphant from 
this great struggle of the nations and, chas- 
tened and refined thereby, will, by Its example 
and Influence, point the way for the develop- 
ment of man. 

The present organization, economic and 
political, of the German Empire, which also 
bears In Its constitution the more significant 
title of the United States of Germany, is in 
very many Important respects the opposing 
counterpart of that of the British United 
Kingdom and Colonial Empire. Its eco- 
nomic system is by far the most efficient, most 



94 The European War 

genuinely democratic which exists at the pres- 
ent moment In the world, or has ever ex- 
isted. There Is no great state In the world 
today In which there Is so general and even 
a distribution of the fruits of civilization, 
spiritual and material, among all the people 
as in the United States of Germany. And 
there Is no state, great or small, In which the 
general plane of civilization Is so high. Edu- 
cation Is universal and Illiteracy Is completely 
stamped out; there are no slums, no proletar- 
iat, and no pauperism; prosperity Is univer- 
sal; and the sense of duty is the governing 
principle of life, public and private, from the 
highest to the lowest. The Institutions of 
the country are adapted and adjusted to 
bring each Individual person Into the place 
and sphere for which he or she Is best capaci- 
tated, thus avoiding loss by the abrasions 
of economic friction. 

First and most fundamental of all, Ger- 
man agriculture has been systematically de- 
veloped, improved, and protected until it 
has reached the highest point of productive- 



The Underlying Causes 95 

ness known to the world. It is a land of 
small proprietors, where relatively few great 
estates exist and where the relatively few 
tenant farmers hold leases of communal land 
rather than of land in private ownership. 
Forests are preserved for furnishing wood 
and lumber and protecting the water courses, 
but pasture land is limited and the greatest 
possible area is kept under the plow. Fos- 
tered by law, pursued with intelligence and 
individual interest, and enriched by science, 
the German agriculture is so intensive that 
one acre of German land produces as much 
as three acres of Russian land, although 
originally poorer and more difficult to culti- 
vate. Feed the people with home product, 
has been the first principle of the German 
economic system. With two hundred and 
eight thousand square miles of territory, an 
area not as great as our single State of 
Texas, the United States of Germany can 
produce all the food absolutely necessary to 
sustain seventy millions of people. The 
German Empire does not thus absolutely 



96 The ^European War 

require colonies for her food necessities, nor 
does It need the rent from city houses to 
keep up Its farms and country estates. In 
Germany the country supports the city more 
than the city supports the country. 

Upon this natural and healthy foundation 
for their economic system, consciously and 
tenaciously preserved, the Germans have 
built their manufactures and their commerce. 
They have built these carefully, scientifically, 
and with unwearying Industry. They have 
not allowed factory life to make slums of 
their cities, nor to produce a proletariat. By 
requiring employers to contribute with the 
state and the employees to the establishment 
of insurance and pension funds, they have se- 
cured to labor Its proper share in the wealth 
produced. And by enlisting the personal in- 
terest of the employees In the excellence of 
their own work, they have brought the prod- 
ucts of their manufactures to such a degree 
of perfection that wherever they are ad- 
mitted they compete successfully with those 
of any other country. 



The Underlying Causes 97 

German commerce therefore Is not de- 
pendent upon vast colonial possessions. De- 
pots, coaling, and supply stations, of course, 
It must have, and a strong navy for Its pro- 
tection against the robbers of the sea, but 
Germany does not find It necessary to her 
existence to be continually grabbing the ter- 
ritory of the world for colonial markets. The 
open door Is all Germany needs, with the 
excellence of her manufactures and the effi- 
ciency of her commerce and methods of 
trade, to assure her Indefinite Industrial ex- 
pansion. Her economic system Is thus not 
the system of a land-grabbing empire. In the 
twenty years of her wonderful Industrial 
development between the years 1890 and 
19 10, she acquired less than two thousand 
square miles of foreign territory, while Great 
Britain acquired nearly two million, Russia 
almost as much, France six to eight hundred 
thousand, Belgium a million, and even the 
United States of America about one hun- 
dred and fifty thousand, and while Germany 
acquired the bits of this small area. In about 



98 The ^European War 

every case, by purchase or lease, all the other 
countries seized most, if not all, of their 
gains by military conquest. 

Let us now turn to the German political 
system and mark its points of difference from 
that of the British Empire. In the first place 
it is a federal union of self-governing States. 
Such a system requires a written constitution 
to delimit with necessary exactness the rela- 
tive governmental spheres of the Central 
Government and the States of the Union. 
The German political system Is founded upon 
such a Constitution, which was framed by 
representatives of the governments of the 
several States, adopted by a convention of 
popular delegates chosen by universal man- 
hood suffrage, and ratified by the legislatures 
of the different States. 

Besides distributing all governmental 
power between the Imperial Government 
and the States of the Union, it distributes 
the powers of the Imperial Government 
between the legislature and the executive, 
conferring upon the Imperial Legislature 



The Underlying Causes 99 

— a body the members of one house of 
which are chosen by universal manhood suf- 
frage and direct election, while those of the 
other are appointed by the States of the 
Union — the power to make the laws, and 
upon the executive, the Emperor, the power 
to execute the laws or rather to supervise the 
execution of the laws. The German Govern- 
ment is thus constitutionally limited govern- 
ment, limited politically by the distribution 
of governmental powers between the Impe- 
rial Government and the States of the Union 
and by the distribution of the powers of the 
Imperial Government between the legislature 
and the executive, and limited judicially by 
the bills of individual rights in each of the 
State constitutions and by the fixing of cer- 
tain of the fundamental duties and rights of 
the individual in the Imperial Constitution. 
One among these duties, which must also 
be regarded as a fundamental right, is the 
constitutional requirement upon every able- 
bodied male German to bear arms, and the 
fixing of the time for which his services are 



loo The European War 

or may be required, which also means beyond 
which they may not be required. I call this 
a right as well as a duty. In the Constitution 
of the United States of America it is so 
treated, and is declared as follows : *'A well- 
regulated militia being necessary to the secur- 
ity of a free state, the right of the people to 
keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." 
It is the German way to put the duty first and 
treat the right as the attending incident. This 
is the keynote to the German character, polit- 
ical and economic as well as private. The 
rights guaranteed to the individual by this 
constitutional provision requiring universal 
military service are that there shall be no 
professional army separate from the general 
citizenship of the Empire with separate in- 
terests from those of that citizenship, no 
inability on the part of that general citizen- 
ship, springing from ignorance of the use of 
arms, to cope with any arbitrary use by gov- 
ernment of military power, and that there 
shall be no power in the Government to re- 
quire more than the Constitution prescribes. 



The Underlying Causes loi 

The so-called German militarism turns out, 
thus, when correctly understood, to be not 
only a popular duty but a popular right of 
the most fundamental and, for Germany, 
most essential character. It originated in the 
great efforts of Prussia to rid the German 
States of the invasions of the first Napoleon. 
Its spirit and purpose were, therefore, at 
the outset, defensive, and the point of that 
defense was first turned against France. But 
the expulsion of the French from German 
soil was accomplished by the aid of Russia. 
Russia was, thereby, introduced into Ger- 
many and her influence over the politics of 
middle Europe became balefuUy paramount. 

In the latter half of the century Russia's 
so-called Pan-Slavic plans, the plans for the 
disruption of the Ottoman Empire and the 
conquest of Constantinople, began to take 
form, and Germany now found itself com- 
pelled to defend middle Europe against the 
peril threatening it from the east as well as 
from the west, and this has been its mission 
to the present day. Down to August i, 19 14, 



I02 The -European War 

German diplomacy, backed by German mili- 
tarism, had been able to keep the peril from 
the east and the peril from the west apart 
and to give to Continental Europe such a 
period of peace and prosperity as It had 
never before enjoyed, but on that eventful 
day British diplomacy triumphed over Ger- 
man diplomacy and brought the two perils 
together and sealed the union by British de- 
termination to destroy the naval and com- 
mercial power of Germany. 

German militarism Is, thus, when properly 
understood, seen to be democratic and de- 
fensive. It Is the only kind of militarism 
compatible with popular liberty and consti- 
tutional government. It Is the permanent, 
professional army in rank and file which, on 
the other hand. Is dangerous to liberty at 
home and given to adventure abroad. More- 
over, German militarism has been so devel- 
oped and regulated as to prove rather an 
economic advantage than an economic bur- 
den. This is owing to the fact that the 
German army Is not simply an organization 



The Underlying Causes 103 

for drill, discipline, and fighting, but that it 
is also a school of general physical culture, 
through which the average life of German 
men has been increased by ten years and their 
average capacity for any kind of work by 
twenty-five per cent; that it is a school of in- 
tellectual culture in which, besides military 
drill and tactics, mathematics, engineering, 
physics, geography, and sanitation are taught 
to all the men; that it is a school of moral 
culture which prevents demoralization and 
dissoluteness in the young men at the most 
critical age; that it is a school of politeness 
in which rudeness of manners gives way to 
habits of courtesy; and that it Is a school 
of genuine patriotism through which the 
spirit of provincialism is made to yield to 
national loyalty. These educational and 
practical compensations overbalance the eco- 
nomic burden of German militarism and dis- 
tinguish it from the militarism of Russia and 
France, although they are all based upon the 
same principle of universal military service. 
The system of commandership Is, also, much 



" ^ u ^'104 The ^European War 



>^ 



less autocratic than In the military systems of 
Great Britain, Russia, or France. The par- 
ticipation in the same by the executive heads 
of the different States of the Union and the 
exclusive power of the Federal Council, the 
upper house of the legislature, to authorize a 
declaration of war, give the German system 
a constitutional character and limitation 
which the others do not possess at all. 

Finally, the German communal and local 
governmental organization Is the most per- 
fect known to modern politics. It began its 
modern development about a hundred years 
ago with the municipal system of Stein, and 
was completed with what is known as the 
KreiS'Ordntinff, the provincial and district or- 
ganization, to which we may attach the name 
of von Gneist, though others participated In 
Its creation. Under it the most honest, effi- 
cient, and prosperous communal life which 
the world has ever known has been produced 
and developed. No slums, no illiteracy, and 
no proletariat are to be found In any German 
city or commune, while the control is more 



The Underlying Causes 105 

genuinely democratic and the distribution of 
the fruits of civilization is more even and 
general than what prevails in any other 
country. 

To me the attempt made in Great Britain 
and the United States to represent Heinrich 
von Treitschke as the fashioner of German 
institutions and policies seems, to say the 
least, disingenuous. I knew von Treitschke 
well. He was my teacher, and I felt great 
admiration for his brilliant rhetorical powers 
and his enthusiastic nationalism. I never 
took him very seriously, and I never knew 
that anybody else did. He said a great many 
sound and sensible things and some extrava- 
gant things. The sound things are, however, 
never quoted now, but his extravaganzas are 
developed into caricatures. He was a man 
largely shut away from practical personal 
intercourse with the world by his extreme 
deafness, and was a prey to his own imagi- 
nation. I remember distinctly a conversation 
with him in the year 1878, in which he told 
me that orthodox political economy was not 



io6 The European War 

then well represented in the Berlin Univer- 
sity, that a young teacher named Adolf Wag- 
ner, with socialistic leanings, was guiding the 
students astray, and that the Faculty of 
Philosophy In the University had requested 
him, Treltschke, to deliver a course of lec- 
tures on political economy as an offset to 
Wagner's Influence and that he was prepar- 
ing the course. But those of us who are ac- 
quainted with German Institutions know now 
that Germany has followed Wagner, rather 
than von Treltschke, In the development of 
its economic Institutions, and that the demo- 
cratic socialistic system of pensions and insur- 
ance, through which a more even distribution 
of wealth between capital and labor has been 
attained In Germany than elsewhere, is to be 
attributed, in large part at least, to Wagner 
and not at all to von Treltschke. And yet I 
have not seen the name of Adolf Wagner 
mentioned a single time In any American 
newspaper since the outbreak of this war. 

Neither had vonTreitschke any more influ- 
ence upon the development of the political 



The Underlying Causes 107 

institutions of the Empire than of the eco- 
nomic institutions. As I remember him, he 
was a member of the National Liberal party, 
and a staunch Unionist; but the leader of the 
party at that time was Edward Lasker, who 
certainly did a vast deal more than von 
Treitschke in forming its principles and poli- 
cies and in securing the legislation which that 
party left upon the statute book of the Em- 
pire ; and yet I have never seen the mention 
of Edward Lasker's name in any American 
newspaper since the outbreak of this war. 
The man, however, who, after the forma- 
tion of the Empire, exercised, next to Bis- 
marck himself, the largest influence upon the 
development of Germany's political and judi- 
cial institutions was Rudolf von Gneist, Pro- 
fessor and Rector in the Berlin University, 
chairman of the Judiciary Committee in the 
Reichstag, and teacher of Prince William, 
now the German Emperor, in political science 
and public law. I knew this man well also. 
I attended his lectures and worked in his 
seminar. He was a great student of English 



io8 The European War 

and American institutions. He spent years 
in England investigating the working of the 
British Government from highest to. lowest 
instance. He wrote the two monumental 
works : The Administrative Law of England 
and Self Government in England^ and it was 
under the influence of the principles put forth 
in these that local administration in Germany 
has been modified and reformed in no incon- 
siderable degree. Moreover, it was Pro- 
fessor von Gneist who contended that the 
German imperial courts had, from the nature 
of written constitutional law, the power to 
nullify any legislative act they might be called 
upon to apply, which, in their opinion, con- 
travened the provisions of the Constitution, 
one of the most fundamental principles of 
genuine constitutional government, as we 
Americans well know. And yet I have never 
seen the name of Professor von Gneist men- 
tioned in any American newspaper since the 
outbreak of this war. 

Everything has been done, and done sys- 
tematically, and done according to a seem- 



The Underlying Causes 109 

Ingly long-matured and sinister plan to give 
the American people not simply an errone- 
ous^ but an absolutely false, conception of 
German Institutions, purposes, and aspira- 
tions. But all this is vain and futile, short- 
sighted and injurious. As Lincoln said, 
"You can fool all the people some of the 
time and some of the people all the time, but 
you cannot fool all the people all of the 
time." The Destiny which rules this world 
will sooner or later sweep away this veil of 
falsehood, deceit, and hypocrisy and will 
place that one of the two systems I have de- 
scribed in the van of civilization's onward 
march which will bring to mankind as a 
■ whole the largest store of the fruits of civili- 
zation, most evenly distributed among all the 
members of the human race. 

This might, conceivably, be accomplished 
through peaceable development, but in the 
past it has been chiefly done through the up- 
heavals of war. And it may be that this is 
just what is happening now. It may be that 
mankind is now being called upon to make its 



no The European War 

selection, or, more correctly, to see the selec- 
tion made for it through the mighty events 
now transpiring, between the two systems 
above delineated: on the one hand, the sys- 
tem of the Colonial Empire, with its upper 
ten thousand rolling in wealth, splendor, and 
luxury and its hundreds of thousands, nay 
millions, groveling in ignorance, want, 
misery and crime; with its grip upon a 
quarter of the earth's land surface and a 
quarter of mankind of all races and colors 
as its subjects; with its continual territorial 
expansion through intrigue, war, and blood- 
shed; with its sovereignty over the high 
seas and a vast naval power to sustain it, 
which may, at any moment, shut up the ports 
of any other country and cut it off from any 
communication with the outside world, and, 
in many cases, starve it into submission to 
its will; with its unlimited government in 
the hands of a small group of men respon- 
sible only to a little larger group, a small 
group of men who do not hesitate to commit 
the Empire in secret agreements and under- 



The Underlying Causes iii 

Standings of the most momentous nature; 
and with its necessity to destroy by force any 
successful rival in the world's trade; or, on 
the other hand, the system of national states 
of moderate and substantially permanent 
areas and of homogeneous populations ; with 
constitutionally limited government partici- 
pated in, through the federal system, by the 
representative men of every section; with a 
fair distribution of the fruits of civilization 
so that there shall be no illiteracy, no pau- 
perism and little crime ; with agriculture and 
industry so developed and balanced that each 
nation may substantially provide itself with 
the necessities of life; with manufactures 
which, by their excellence alone, will com- 
mand markets ; with no compelling necessity, 
therefore, for colonies and dependencies nor 
for wars through which to acquire them ; and 
with the whole world as an open field where 
intelligence, capacity, honesty, and industry 
will not be cheated by brute force of their 
just reward. 

Which of these systems now is the system 



112 The European War 

for the twentieth century? Which will lead 
mankind to the higher plane of civilization? 
Which is best calculated to give mankind 
prosperity and peace? I divine that this 
is the great problem for the solution of which 
Europe is now writhing in the agony of a 
great labor pain of human development, and 
while God grant that we may escape active 
participation in the suffering, we cannot avoid 
having our own interests most profoundly in- 
volved in the outcome. Let us make sure 
that we correctly conceive what those inter- 
ests are and how they will be best subserved. 



CHAPTER IV 

AMERICAN INTERESTS IN THE OUTCOME OF 
THE WAR 

T SEE the prophecy so often expressed that 
something terrible may come to us and to 
the world through German Militarism, while 
British Navalism passes almost unchallenged, 
that I wonder whether one of the qualities of 
the prophet is that he is constituted without 
memory. I do not think that I possess any 
of the qualities of the prophet, certainly not 
the one just mentioned, for I find myself al- 
ways going back a few steps in order to get 
direction and momentum for every new 
spring forward. After all, this seems to me 
the surer way. It certainly is when there is 
such rich experience from which to draw as 
there is upon the subject of our relation to 
German Militarism and British Navalism. 

We may say that our experience with both 
begins with and extends through our exist- 

113 



114 ^^^ ^European War 

ence here. In our Colonial Period almost the 
entire western border of our country was 
occupied by Germans. It fell to them, there- 
fore, to defend, in first instance, the colonists 
from the attacks of the French and the In- 
dians. They formed what was known in 
those times as the Regiment of Royal Ameri- 
cans, a brigade rather than a regiment, num- 
bering some four thousand men, and the 
bands led by Nicholas Herkimer and Conrad 
Weiser. Many of the men composing these 
bodies had been schooled in military tactics 
and discipline in their German fatherland and 
the service which they rendered in creating, 
organizing, and drilling this little army of 
some six thousand men cannot be overesti- 
mated. It enabled us to resist successfully 
the French and their Indian allies in the 
Seven Years War, which they made upon us 
from 1756 to 1763, and it gave us a nucleus 
for our Revolutionary Army. At the out- 
break of our War of Independence, Herki- 
mer, Muhlenberg, and Schlatter gathered the 
Germans in the Mohawk Valley and the Vir- 



American Interests 115 

ginia Valley together and organized them 
into companies for service. Baron von Ot- 
tendorff, another German soldier, recruited 
and drilled the famous Armand Legion. And 
when Washington's first bodyguard was sus- 
pected of treasonable sentiments and plans, 
it was dismissed and a new bodyguard con- 
sisting almost entirely of Germans was 
formed. This new bodyguard was supported 
by a troop of cavalry consisting entirely of 
Germans, under the command of Major 
Barth von Heer, one of Frederick the Great's 
finest cavalry officers. This troop stood by 
Washington during the entire war, and 
twelve of them escorted him to Mt. Vernon 
when he retired. 

But the greatest contribution of German 
Militarism to the cause of our independence 
was Baron von Steuben, the famous aide de 
camp of Frederick the Great. He came to 
us at the most critical period of the Revolu- 
tion, that awful winter of 1777-78, when the 
remnant of our forces, a small band of 
ragged, starved, and discouraged militiamen, 



ii6 The ^European War 



were trying to keep body and soul together 
at Valley Forge. He shared their suffer- 
ings. He introduced the Prussian organiza- 
tion, discipline, and drill among them. In a 
few months he made a real army out of them, 
which turned defeat Into victory and made 
our Independence possible. He then pro- 
ceeded to the south and organized and disci- 
plined the army for General Greene. He 
was present at the siege of Yorktown, and, 
as the only American officer who had ever 
witnessed the storming of a fortified place, 
he rendered most invaluable service, and it 
was his fortune to be in command in the 
trenches when the British flag was hauled 
down. 

And besides Steuben, there were Baron 
de Kalb, the most brilliant cavalry officer; 
Johann Schott, the most efficient artillery 
officer; General Lutterloh, the quartermaster 
general, and Christopher Ludwig, the master 
purveyor, all Germans, who had had the 
training of German Militarism. It is not 
too much to say that German Militarism 



American Interests 117 

did probably as much as any other one thing 
to make our final triumph over Great Britain 
in our war for independence possible. 

But we have had another and more recent 
war for our National existence: the war of 
1861-65, the Civil War, as we of the North 
called it; the War between the States, as 
they of the South called it. Let us see if 
German Militarism played any part in that 
great struggle, and if so, what that part was. 

Everyone, even only slightly acquainted 
with the history of this war, knows that the 
question of first and greatest importance 
which arose and demanded solution was that 
of the position in the struggle of the border 
slave States, namely: Maryland, Kentucky, 
and Missouri. Mr. Lincoln's administra- 
tion gave its attention most seriously and 
anxiously to the work of holding these States 
back from passing secession ordinances, and 
preventing them from being occupied by the 
armies of the Southern Confederacy. 

The most important among these States 
was Missouri. It was the largest; it reached 



ii8 The ^European War 

away up Into the very heart of the North; 
it commanded the left bank of the Missis- 
sippi for some five hundred miles; and the 
great United States arsenal of the West, con- 
taining the arms and munitions for that 
whole section of our country, was located in 
St. Louis. It had been stacked to its utmost 
capacity by the Secretary of War of the pre- 
ceding administration, Mr. Floyd of Virginia, 
in the expectation that it would certainly fall 
into the hands of the South. The Governor 
of the State, C. F. Jackson, manifested the 
stand he would take in his reply to President 
Lincoln's requisition for Missouri's quota of 
the first call for troops. He defied the Presi- 
dent in the words: "Your requisition, in my 
judgment, is illegal, unconstitutional, and 
revolutionary in its object; inhuman and dia- 
bolical, and cannot be complied with." 

It happened most fortunately, however, 
that the commandant of the arsenal was a 
staunch Unionist, Nathaniel Lyon. He im- 
mediately recognized the peril of the situ- 
ation. He had only three men to guard the 



American Interests 119 

arsenal and there was in the city a full com- 
pany of secessionist militia calling themselves 
Minute Men. Moreover, two companies of 
the state militia composed of Germans had 
shortly before been disarmed by the general 
of the State militia. Under these conditions 
Lyon turned to F. P. Blair for advice. Blair 
was acquainted with the views and sympa- 
thies of the inhabitants perfectly, and knew 
that he could rely only upon the Germans to 
save the arsenal and then the city and the 
State for the Union. 

The Germans of the city were organized 
in Turner-Unions, in which they had, besides 
practicing gymnastics, kept up their knowl- 
edge of military drill and evolutions. After 
some hesitation, during which the movements 
of the secessionists to seize the arsenal be- 
came more and more threatening, Lyon 
called the German Turners into the arsenal, 
armed them thoroughly and garrisoned the 
place with them. Five regiments of Germans 
were now hastily organized and armed. They 
were the regiments commanded by Blair, 



I20 The 'European War 

Bornstein, SIgel, Schiittner, and Salomon. 
The arsenal and city were now safe, and 
some thirty thousand stands of arms with 
munitions were sent over into Illinois to arm 
the Illinois troops for the occupation of Mis- 
souri. This was the first great service which 
German Militarism rendered to the cause of 
the Union in the perilous month of April, 
1861. 

It would fill a volume to recite the services 
which followed this throughout those terrible 
four years, during which Union was pre- 
served and slavery destroyed. Without the 
Germans, who almost to a man knew military 
drill, discipline, and organization, I do not 
know how we could have prepared our 
armies for the work which they were called 
upon to do. The people of the North were 
unaccustomed to the use of arms, knew little 
of military organization, and were restive 
under discipline. We had our Westpointers 
and they were good, but far too few in 
number to train the vast hosts of raw recruits 
which were now called under arms. The 



American Interests 121 

two hundred thousand native born Ger- 
mans who served in our armies were nearly 
all of them experienced in the use of arms 
and accustomed to the severities of military 
discipline. A very large proportion of these 
were engaged as officers in teaching our men 
to become soldiers. Among the taught were 
nearly four hundred thousand men of Ger- 
man descent, many of whom, through their 
practices in their Turn-and-Schiitzen Hallen, 
were the quickest of all our volunteers to 
become efficient soldiers. 

The German and German-American con- 
tingent in our armies amounted thus, first and 
last, to some five hundred thousand soldiers. 
They were led by men such as Heinzelman, 
Rosecrans, Schurz, Sigel, Osterhaus, Willich, 
Hartranft, Steinwehr, Wagner, Hecker, and 
a thousand others. Mrs. Jefferson Davis, 
the wife of the Confederate President, has 
often said to me that without the Germans 
the North could never have overcome the 
armies of the Confederacy; and unless that 
had been accomplished then, this Continent 



122 The ^European War 

would have been, since then, the theater of 
continuous war Instead of the home of peace. 

Now let us contrast with these great 
services of German Militarism to our inde- 
pendence and our National existence, the 
Injuries which British Navalism, to say 
nothing of British Militarism, has Inflicted 
upon us. 

We will begin with the Declaration of 
Independence, as I suppose it is still in order 
to cite that document in these United States. 
In it we meet the following statements: 
"He," that is the King, the British Govern- 
ment, "has plundered our seas, ravaged our 
coasts, burnt our towns, cut off our trade with 
all parts of the world." Perhaps the opinion 
of the day may hold that we were then his 
own and he could do with us as he would. 
I will, therefore, not dwell longer upon the 
treatment which we received from the British 
Government during our Colonial period. 

No sooner had we become by successful 
resistance independent of Great Britain than 
she began harassing us in every possible way 



American Interests 123 



upon the sea, legally and illegally. Her war 
ships stopped our merchantmen, no matter 
where they were going or what they were 
carrying, and not only took what their officers 
termed contraband of war out of them, but 
took our crews out of them and impressed 
them into the British naval service under the 
claim that they were British citizens, which. 
In most cases at least, was not true, and 
whether they were or not, they could not be 
lawfully taken from American ships. The 
British Navy went so far In this matter, as 
to stop by force our own war ships and 
search them for British seamen, and in 
several cases, notably In that of our frigate, 
the Chesapeake, June 22, 1807, actually took 
men out of our war ships and Impressed them 
into the service of the British Navy. 

At that time Great Britain was off-and-on 
engaged In war with France, and during such 
periods had, of course, the right to blockade 
the French ports and those of the allies of 
France. But there was a law of blockade 
which required as the condition of this situa- 



124 ^^^ ^European War 

tion that armed vessels In sufficient power 
to repel ordinary attempts to enter must be 
present before the port blockaded and notice 
must have been given of the actual existence 
of the blockade. Great Britain paid no 
attention to these limitations. She declared 
all the ports of France, of her allies, and of 
her colonies blockaded, whether they were 
so or not, and seized American vessels, 
among others, far out upon the high seas 
under the claim that they were headed for 
ports declared by Great Britain to be in a 
state of blockade, or had upon them goods the 
product or manufacture of countries at enmity 
with Great Britain. The British Govern- 
ment also issued the entirely arbitrary order 
that trade between a country and its colonies, 
not permitted to the ships of other nations 
in time of peace, could not be opened to 
them by that country in time of war between 
that country and another power. For twenty 
years, from 1792 to 18 12, Great Britain 
imposed upon us all of these practices, 
unlawfully, arbitrarily, and arrogantly until 



American Interests 125 

finally we could stand it no longer and we 
threw down the gage of battle. 

The war began for us rather successfully, 
almost brilliantly, on the water. Our impro- 
vised Navy did at first excellent work, but 
at the beginning of 18 14 we had hardly a 
vessel of any kind left upon the sea. The 
British fleet had, moreover, from its Govern- 
ment the explicit and distinctly expressed 
order "to destroy and lay waste all towns 
and districts of the United States found 
accessive to the attack of the British arma- 
ments," and it followed these instructions 
effectively. From the Bay of Fundy to 
the Chesapeake our ports were blockaded 
and our towns reduced to ashes, and finally 
the City of Washington was captured by the 
expedition up the Chesapeake, and the 
Capitol, the President's Mansion, and the 
public buildings were plundered and burned 
to the ground. When we emerged from the 
war of 1 8 12-15 we had neither navy nor 
merchant marine and in the Treaty of 
Peace, Great Britain renounced none of her 



126 The European War 

arbitrary practices upon the sea. The war 
brought little relief from the tyranny of 
British Navallsm. 

During the next forty years we constructed 
slowly and with much difficulty our new Navy 
and merchant marine, and in i860 there 
was again some prospect of our becoming a 
maritime power. Then came the outbreak 
of the Civil War and Great Britain saw 
again her opportunity to reduce us once 
more to weakness. Hardly a month passed 
before she recognized the belligerency of the 
Southern Confederacy. The Confederacy had 
no navy, but it had licensed some privateers, 
which, during the first few months of the 
rebellion, made capture of a considerable 
number of our merchantmen. In a very 
short time, however, these privateers were 
all either captured by the vessels of the 
United States Navy or were shut up in the 
southern ports by the quite effective blockade. 
There was no probability, therefore, that 
any foreign power would be brought into any 
contact whatever with the Confederacy and 



American Interests 127 

no need, therefore, of recognizing it as 
belligerent, or as anything. 

When Mr. Charles Francis Adams, our 
newly appointed Minister to Great Britain, 
arrived at Liverpool on May 13, 1861, he 
was met by this declaration of recognition by 
the British Government of the belligerency 
of the Southern Confederacy. He saw at a 
glance that Lord Palmerston's Government 
"desired," as Mr. Gladstone afterwards 
expressed It, "the severance" — that Is the 
separation of our country ^ — " as a diminution 
of a dangerous power." It looked to Mr. 
Adams as If the British recognition of the 
independence of the Confederacy might 
follow at any moment. The anti-Slavery 
sentiment in England upon which he had 
counted seemed utterly eclipsed by something 
else and that something he soon found to 
be nothing more elevated than commercial 
greed. 

The British Government and the British 
nation were possessed by the prospect of 
monopolizing the trade and commerce of 



128 The European War 

the cotton-raising Southern Confederacy and 
had neither eye nor ear for anything else. 
Such motives usually seek to hide them- 
selves behind some profession of virtue or 
some violent indignation at the claimed 
Iniquity of others. Mr. Adams found this 
American Iniquity with which the British 
Government and public were deadening the 
consciousness of their real purpose to be 
the caricature of the personalities of Mr. 
Lincoln and Mr. Seward. Mr. Henry 
Adams, the Minister's son and Private 
Secretary, wrote: 

London created a nightmare of its own, and 
gave it the shape of Abraham Lincoln. Beside this 
it placed another demon, if possible more devilish, 
and called it Mr. Seward. In regard to these two 
men English society seemed demented. Defense 
was useless; explanation was vain; one could only 
let the passion exhaust itself. One's best friends 
were as unreasonable as enemies, for the belief in 
poor Mr. Lincoln's brutality and Mr. Seward's 
ferocity became a dogma of popular Faith. . . . 
The London Times and all its satellites were as 
usual doing the yellow work for the Foreign Sec- 



American Interests 129 

retary, printing every morning in great head lines 
the words : "Another Disastrous Federal Defeat ; " 
and the Cabinet Ministers were calling gleefully to 
each other that "the Federals had got another 
licking." 

The first real opportunity came to show 
their official animus in the Trent affair in 
November of 1861. Our Captain Wilkes 
had read his international law concerning 
contraband of war in British textbooks and 
supposed that he had both British principle 
and British precedent for taking the Con- 
federate Envoys, Mason and Slidell, out of 
the British merchantmen, the Trent, and 
conveying them upon his own ship as prison- 
ers to Boston. He had made the little 
mistake of not bringing the Trent along too 
and delivering ship and Envoys to the juris- 
diction of a prize court of the United States. 
It was enough, however, in the existing 
temper of the British Government to lead 
to demonstrations. 

So soon as the news of Wilkes' act 
arrived in England, although Mr. Adams 



130 The European War 

communicated to the British Government 
instructions to him from Washington dis- 
avowing responsibility for the act and 
expressing readiness to discuss the matter, 
preparations for war were instantly begun. 
The arsenals resounded with activity and 
troops were embarked for America. We lib- 
erated the Confederate Envoys promptly and 
the British Government was obliged to see 
this opportunity escape them. 

Mr. Adams and the Washington Govern- 
ment knew, however, from that moment 
onward the hostile disposition which they 
would be compelled to encounter at every 
point. It was entirely evident to Mr. 
Adams that the British Government, led by 
Palmerston, Russell, and Gladstone, were 
working, and would work, on the assump- 
tion that the Southern Confederacy was a 
fait accompli. He undoubtedly conveyed 
this information to Mr. Seward, who sent 
over our most accomplished politician, Thur- 
low Weed, and our most accomplished 
lawyer, William M. Evarts, to convince the 



American Interests 131 

politicians and the people of their mistaken 
opinion and to assist Mr. Adams in avoiding 
the legal pitfalls which might be laid for 
him. He needed them both. 

Already during the months when the con- 
troversy over the Trent affair was taking 
its course, one James D. Bulloch arrived 
in England as the agent of the Southern 
Confederacy for securing the construction 
and equipment of a Confederate Navy. 
The laws of Great Britain were construed 
to permit this, by the simple subterfuge of 
keeping the vessel and the armament sep- 
arate until they passed the territorial limit 
of the British jurisdiction. And the British 
Government did not recognize any interna- 
tional law outside of the Acts of Parliament 
or specific treaty obligations. 

In spite of the protests of Mr. Adams 
that Great Britain was at least violating the 
obligations of neutrality in permitting ships 
of war to be constructed in her ports for 
the Confederates, who, according to Great 
Britain's own conception of the belligerency 



132 The European War 

of the Confederates, were our enemies, die 
British Government allowed the work to go 
on, until a number of cruisers of the most 
formidable type were built and equipped and 
let loose upon the merchant marine of 
the United States for Its destruction, and 
they destroyed it pretty effectually to the 
advantage of the British carrying trade 
upon the high seas. 

Encouraged by the success of their own 
arbitrariness and our inability to meet it 
under the strain of our domestic conflict, the 
British Government became more and more 
reckless and arrogant. In the year 1863, 
the Lairds at Birkenhead constructed a 
number of steam rams, completely equipped, 
inside of the jurisdiction of the British Gov- 
ernment, for the Confederates. Mr. Adams 
protested to Lord Russell with all the vigor 
of his vigorous nature, but at first in vain. 
In the midst of the controversy, however, 
came the news of Gettysburg and VIcksburg. 
Taking advantage of the Influence of these 
victories over the minds of the British 



American Interests 133 

Ministers and upon the opinion of the 
British public, Mr. Adams addressed his 
famous note of September 5, 1863, to Lord 
Russell, in which he distinctly accused the 
British Government with connivance in the 
Confederate armaments, and closed his com- 
munication with the words: *'It would be 
superfluous in me to point out to your Lord- 
ship that this is war." This was something 
which the British Government understood, 
and three days afterwards Mr. Adams 
received from Lord Russell information that 
his Government had given instructions for- 
bidding the departure of the two Ironclads. 
This did not, however, serve to quiet the 
indignation of the people of the United 
States against the British Government and 
people, and the desire to make stiff demands 
upon that Government and back them up 
with the great military power with which the 
Union emerged from the Civil War was 
very general and very pronounced. The 
British Government saw that we were in 
earnest and gave consent to a treaty with 



134 ^^^ ^European War 

us in January, 1869, which the Senate of 
the United States regarded as no sufficient 
promise of redress for the injuries done us, 
and promptly rejected it. 

In his message to Congress of December 
6, 1869, President Grant denounced this 
proposed agreement most unsparingly. He 
said: 

Towards the close of the last administration a 
convention was signed in London for the settlement 
of all outstanding claims between Great Britain and 
the United States, which failed to receive the advice 
and consent of the Senate to its ratification. The 
time and the circumstances attending the negotia- 
tions of that treaty were unfavorable to its accept- 
ance by the people of the United States, and its 
provisions were wholly inadequate for the settle- 
ment of the grave wrongs that had been sustained 
by this government, as well as by its citizens. The 
injuries resulting to the United States by reason of 
the course adopted by Great Britain during our late 
Civil War in the increased rates of insurance, in the 
diminution of exports and imports and other ob- 
structions to domestic industry and production, in 
its effect upon the foreign commerce of the coun- 
tTYi in the decrease and transfer to Great Britain of 



American Interests 135 

our commercial marine,* in the prolongation of the 
war and the increased cost, both in treasure and 
in lives, of its suppression, could not be adjusted 
and satisfied as ordinary commercial claims which 
continually arise among commercial nations ; and 
yet the convention treated them as such ordinary 
claims, from which they differ more widely in the 
gravity of their character than in the magnitude of 
their amount, great even as is that diiference. Not 
a word was found in the treaty, and not an infer- 
ence could be drawn from it to remove the sense 
of the unfriendliness of the course of Great Britain 
in our struggle for existence, which had so deeply 
and universally impressed itself upon the people of 
this country. Believing that a convention thus mis- 
conceived in its scope and inadequate in its pro- 
visions would not have produced the hearty, cordial 
settlement of pending questions which alone is con- 
sistent with the relations which I desire to have 
firmly established between the United States and 
Great Britain, I regard the action of the Senate in 
rejecting the treaty to have been wisely taken in the 
interests of peace and as a necessary step in the 
direction of a perfect and cordial friendship be- 
tween the two countries. A sensitive people, con- 
scious of their power, are more at ease under a 
great wrong wholly unatoned than under the re- 
* Italics mine, J. W. B. 



136 The European War 

straint of a settlement which satisfies neither their 
idea of justice nor their grave sense of the grievances 
they have sustained. 

Great Britain practically ignored this 
complaint, and another year slipped by 
with the relations between the two countries 
becoming more strained, when President 
Grant, on December 5, 1870, made the 
following communication to Congress: 

I regret to say that no conclusion has been reached 
for the adjustment of the claims against Great 
Britain growing out of the course adopted by that 
government during the Rebellion. The cabinet of 
London, so far as its views have been expressed, 
does not appear to be willing to concede that Her 
Majesty's Government was guilty of any negli- 
gence, or did or permitted any act during the war 
by which the United States has just cause of com- 
plaint. Our firm and unalterable convictions are 
directly the reverse. I, therefore, recommend to 
Congress to authorize the appointment of a com- 
mission to take proof of the amount and the owner- 
ship of these several claims, on notice to the repre> 
sentative of Her Majesty at Washington, and tha^ 
authority be given for the settlement of these claims 



American Interests 137 

by the United States, so that the government shall 
have the ownership of the private claims, as well as 
the responsible control of all the demands against 
Great Britain. 

The President had chosen well the moment 
to give Great Britain this warning. The 
French Empire was In the dust and the 
German Armies had surrounded Paris. 
With the well-known friendship existing 
between Germany and the United States 
this was no time for Great Britain to risk 
continuance of the misunderstanding with us. 
Early in January of 1871 a special envoy 
from the British Government, Sir John Rose, 
appeared In Washington. The result of the 
negotiations springing out of this advance 
was the Treaty of Washington of 1871 
between Great Britain and the United States, 
according to which all the questions aris- 
ing out of the contentions between Great 
Britain and the United States concerning the 
incidents of the Civil War should be referred 
for arbitration to a Tribunal of five mem- 
bers, one appointed by the President of the 



138 The European War 

United States, one by the Queen of Great 
Britain and Ireland, one by the King of 
Italy, one by the President of Switzerland, 
and one by the Emperor of Brazil; the ques- 
tion of the Northwest Boundary of the 
United States should be referred to the 
German Emperor; and the Fisheries ques- 
tion to a Board of three commissioners, one 
appointed by the President of the United 
States, one by the British Queen, and the 
third by the President and the Queen jointly, 
and in case they could not agree, by the 
Austro-Hungarian Ambassador at the British 
Court. 

When the Geneva Tribunal met and the 
United States laid its claims before it, the 
British Government virtually declined to 
submit to the arbitration of the claims for 
what were termed "National and indirect 
losses," that is " losses in the transfer of the 
American commercial marine to the British 
flag. In the enhanced payment of Insurance 
and In the prolongation of the war and the 
addition of a large sum to the cost of the war 



American Interests 139 

and the suppression of the Rebellion." The 
Tribunal announced that it felt constrained 
to throw them out as not being a good foun- 
dation in International Law for computing 
and awarding damages. The Tribunal 
awarded us a very moderate sum for the 
reimbursement of direct private losses, but 
the vastly greater national and Indirect losses 
have never been compensated or atoned for 
in the slightest degree. 

The boundary question between the 
United States and British Columbia sub- 
mitted to the German Emperor was decided 
by His Majesty In an award, announced in 
October of 1872, sustaining the claim of the 
United States. 

On the other hand, the fisheries question 
presents another instance of British practices 
in diplomacy. When it came to the appoint- 
ment of the Commissioners, the President 
appointed one, the British Government one, 
and the British Government proposed, as 
the third member to be appointed by the two 
governments conjointly, one Maurice Del- 



140 The ^European War 

fosse, the Belgian Minister to the United 
States. President Grant rejected Delfosse 
on the ground that the interests of Great 
Britain and Belgium were altogether too 
closely allied. Great Britain would not 
accept anybody proposed by the United 
States, and so the choice of the third Com- 
missioner fell, according to the provisions 
of the Treaty, to the Austro-Hungarian 
Ambassador at the British Court, Count 
Beust. He should, of course, have been 
informed by the British Government that 
Delfosse was excluded. Whether he was 
so informed we do not know, but he, 
nevertheless, appointed him as the third 
Commissioner. 

Our Government was taken by surprise, 
but Mr. Fish, our Secretary of State, felt 
the embarrassment of resisting further the 
appointment of the Belgian Minister in 
Washington to be too great and acquiesced 
with the best grace possible. Great Britain 
had thus secured two of the three Commis- 
sioners and they proceeded to award a 



American Interests 141 

payment of five million five hundred thou- 
sand dollars from our Government to Great 
Britain. It was a high-handed procedure 
and our Commissioner, Hon. E. H. Kellogg, 
dissented vigorously from the decision, but 
they had the letter of the law on us and we 
had to submit. 

Thus three times in less than a hundred 
years of our history has Great Britain 
destroyed our merchant marine, and we 
have never yet recovered from the last expe- 
rience. The competition which the Germans 
began to set up in the seventies and eighties 
of the last century proved a great relief to 
us. As the German merchant marine grew, 
freights were reduced and the comfort of 
travel greatly improved, and we were able 
to carry on our foreign trade and inter- 
course profitably in foreign bottoms. But 
now, having decided that the interests of 
her World-Empire can no longer suffer this 
competition. Great Britain has struck down 
the German commerce and forbids us to buy 
the interned ships with which to carry on 



142 The European War 

our foreign commerce, under pain of their 
seizure by the British Navy. 

How many more instances do we need to 
demonstrate to us that the system of Colonial 
Empire with the dominance of the seas, and 
the unlimited territorial expansion which it 
claims, is not compatible with the freedom 
and prosperity of the world? Can any 
American with half an eye fail to see that 
our greatest interest in the outcome of this 
war is that the seas shall become free and 
neutral, and that, shall they need policing, 
this shall become international; that the 
open door for trade and commerce shall 
take the place of colonial restrictions or 
preferences, or influences and shall, in times 
of peace, be the universal principle; that 
private property upon the high seas shall be 
inviolable; that trade between neutrals in 
time of war shall be entirely unrestricted, 
and that contraband of war shall have an 
international definition? 

In the second place, what American can- 
not see with half an eye that the destruction 



American Interests 143 

of the German Empire and the advance of 
Russia to the controlling place in Continental 
Europe or even the lessening of the influence 
of the German Empire to the advantage of 
Russia — one of which things is bound to 
result from the triumph of the Allies in 
this war — would be injurious to American 
interests and would conflict with American 
ideals? Leaving out of account altogether 
the close educational bonds between Ger- 
many and the United States, closer than 
those subsisting between us and any other 
country, and the racial sympathies of a large 
part of our best population, let us look at 
the more practical and material interests 
involved. 

In the first place, the German merchant 
marine intermediates our commerce for us 
in larger volume than all the countries of 
Continental Europe now at war with her, 
and has given us more satisfactory service 
than any of them. And, in the second place, 
the German trade with us exceeds in amount, 
by nearly fifty millions of dollars annually. 



144 T^he European War 

our trade with France, Russia, Belgium, 
Servia, and Montenegro, the five Continental 
European nations now at war with Germany, 
taken together. 

Do we not wish to preserve this valuable 
trade? 

Do we wish to see the paralyzing hand 
of the Muscovite laid upon this rich source 
of income to us? 

But some of our all-wise newspaper 
editors say the German people will still be 
there, only the German Empire, as a polit- 
ical and governmental organization, will be 
destroyed. But I doubt very much If the 
German people will be there after the Ger- 
man Empire Is destroyed. I think they will 
stand or fall together, for the German 
Empire is the national, self-ordalned 
organization of the German people and 
without It they themselves know that they 
could not exist as a people In Middle Europe. 
They will uphold It so long as the breath 
of life Is In them and they will He down in 
death wrapt In its colors before they will 



American Interests 145 



submit to the rule of the Slav, the Gaul, 
or the Briton. 

I have, In the previous chapter, described 
briefly what this German Empire as a gov- 
ernmental organization Is, but to Impress 
it more deeply upon the minds of my readers, 
I will quote here what President Grant said 
of It soon after Its formation, In his special 
message of February 7, 1871, to Congress: 

The Union of the States of Germany into a 
form of government similar in many respects to 
that of the American Union is an event that cannot 
fail to touch deeply the sympathies of the people 
of the United States. 

This Union has been brought about by the long- 
continued persistent efforts of the people, with the 
deliberate approval of the governments and people 
of twenty-four* of the German States through 
their regularly constituted representatives. In it 
the American people see an attempt to repro- 
duce in Europe some of the best features of our 
own Constitution with such modifications as the 
history and condition of Germany seem to require. 
The local governments of the several members of 

* Twenty- five, J. JV. B. 



146 The European War 

the Union are preserved, while the power conferred 
upon the Chief imparts strength for the purpose of 
self-defense, without authority to enter upon wars 
of conquest and ambition. 

The cherished aspiration for national unity which 
for ages has inspired the many millions of people 
speaking the same language, inhabiting a contigu- 
ous and compact territory, but unnaturally separated 
and divided by dynastic jealousies and the ambition 
of short-sighted rulers, has been attained, and Ger- 
many now contains a population of about 34,000,- 
000, united, like our own, under one government 
for its relation with other powers, but retaining in 
its several members the right and power of control 
of their local interests, habits, and institutions. 

The bringing of great masses of thoughtful and 
free people under a single government must tend 
to make governments what alone they should be — 
the representatives of the will and the organization 
of the power of the people. The adoption in Europe 
of the American system of union under the control 
and direction of a free people, educated to self- 
restraint, cannot fail to extend popular institutions 
and to enlarge the peaceful influence of American 
ideas. 

Such was the organization of the German 
Empire at the outset and such it has remained 



American Interests 147 

to the present day. In view of all these 
things, how can any genuine American, with 
one grain of common sense and one spark of 
real patriotism left in him, unless he be 
blinded by prejudice or consumed by hypoc- 
risy, regard with favor or even with 
unconcern the substitution of the Muscovite 
autocracy for this Great German system of 
government and economy in Central 
Europe, or the bringing of it in the slightest 
degree under the influence of the Muscovite 
autocracy? What American interest could 
he imagine to be advanced by it? What 
American idea to be furthered by it? If 
such an American should present himself 
before me, I confess that I would not know 
what to say to him ; for, frankly speaking, it 
would seem to me that he were ignoring 
American interests altogether under some 
sinister foreign influence. To me it seems in-- 
disputable that every true American interest, 
moral and material, requires the mainte- 
nance of the German Empire in its present 
organization and power in Middle Europe. 



148 The European War 

Neither the veiled Autocracy of the East nor 
the Gallic Republic of the West can be 
spoken of on the same day with it as the pro- 
ducer of genuine liberty, real progress, and 
universal prosperity. 

Finally, there is one more question of 
vast importance to the people of these United 
States involved in the outcome of this war. 
It is this, namely : What relation is the North 
American Continent to bear hereafter to the 
diplomacy and wars of Europe? 

We had a doctrine, which was intended 
and, in some degree, calculated, to keep 
the American Continents out of European 
entanglements. It was first employed to 
prevent Spain and Portugal from reestab- 
lishing the colonial dependence of South and 
Middle America upon Europe, and to pre- 
vent Russia from extending the dependence 
of North America upon Europe. It cer- 
tainly helped to accomplish the first. Today, 
of the nine millions of square miles of terri- 
tory of South and Middle America inhabited 
by sixty millions of people, only about two 



American Interests 149 

hundred thousand square miles, inhabited by 
less than ^vt hundred thousand people, are 
colonlally dependent upon Europe. 

It also accomplished its purpose in regard 
to the second object. Nevertheless, more 
than the half of North America territorially 
remains today colonially dependent upon 
Europe. We have certainly been altruistic 
with our Monroe Doctrine. We have turned 
and twisted and developed and exagger- 
ated it to get Europe out of South and 
Middle America, and yet we have per- 
mitted the very European state, which 
has always professed to believe in it, to 
hold on to the half of North America and 
to touch our own boundary for more than 
three thousand miles. At the close of our 
Civil War we got Russia off the Continent 
altogether by paying her seven millions of 
dollars for what was then regarded as a huge 
iceberg, and it is probably the greatest diplo- 
matic and political blunder the United States 
ever made that it did not then get Great 
Britain off too. The population of Canada 



150 The European War 

at that time was only about three and a half 
millions of people, the majority of whom, 
probably, were inclined to annexation to 
the United States. Moreover, it had been 
brought quite clearly to our minds during 
our Civil War how easily Canada might be 
made a base of military operations against us. 
And lastly, we had at that moment the large, 
trained, and disciplined Army of seasoned 
veterans with which we could have struck 
down any physical opposition. It was an 
opportunity lost for freeing the North 
American Continent from colonial relations 
to Europe, which has never returned and 
may never return. 

For more than twenty-five years, now, we 
have been consoling ourselves with the idea 
that the bond between Canada and Great 
Britain had become so attenuated that it 
might, at any moment, of itself snap asunder. 
But to our great surprise, almost to our con- 
sternation, we suddenly find that such is not 
the case, that, quite to the contrary, Canada 
is not only involved in the diplomacy and 



American Interests 151 

politics of Europe, but In a great European 
War. By her colonial relationship to Great 
Britain she has been made belligerent in a 
European War and is now therefore subject, 
lawfully, to all the incidents of this condition, 
one of which is that she is open to invasion 
and conquest by the enemies of Great Britain. 
This will not probably happen in this war, 
but it can happen and it would be perfectly 
regular if it did, and it will probably happen 
in the war between Russia and Great Britain, 
which is certain to follow this war, in case 
the Allies are the victors. Now if this thing 
should happen tomorrow or at any time, I 
think it would put our neutrality to a very 
severe test. I would not be willing to vouch 
for its maintenance. We have not yet 
formed any real public opinion about this 
war. Everybody feels, but only relatively 
few really think, and very few possess the 
knowledge upon which to found a sound 
judgment. What we have now is a general 
state of excited feeling, which expresses 
itself in epithet, vituperation, and abuse, 



152 The European War 

which, therefore, engenders the hatreds that 
lead to war. With such a state of feeling the 
invasion of Canada by the enemies of Great 
Britain would in all probability excite us, 
however irrationally, to abandon the neutral 
ground, abandon peace, and become bellig- 
erent. Evidently the longer continuance of 
any colonial relation of any part of North 
America to Europe is not in our interests, 
not promotive of our welfare, and if one of 
the results of this war could be the severing 
of this bond completely, it would be so great 
a guarantee of our future peace and pros- 
perity that we could well bear all the losses 
and inconveniences which the war is now 
imposing upon us. 

But will this be effected by the triumph of 
the Allies ? I cannot believe it. It seems to 
me that the triumph of the Allies will bind 
Canada still closer to the European and 
Asiatic policy of Great Britain, through 
comradeship in the war, participation in 
victory and through the increasing conscious- 
ness of the necessity for the parts of the 



American Interests 153 

British Empire to stand together against 
Russia In the final struggle for the possession 
of Asia. And if Russia should win in this 
final struggle, as I verily believe, with Ger- 
many and Austria-Hungary destroyed and 
with Japan as her ally, she would, then 
Canada might be occupied by Russia or 
Japan and be administered by a satrap from 
Petrograd or Tokio. 

As I see it, only the maintenance of the 
German and Austro-Hungarian Empires, in 
at least the strength and coherence which 
they possessed on August i, 1914, as the 
bulwark against Russian advance westward 
and southward, will bring any peace to the 
world and give to the North American 
Continent any prospect of ultimate deliv- 
erance from entanglements In European 
politics, controversies, and wars. There is 
little question in my mind that with the expe- 
rience of this war our next formulation of 
the Monroe Doctrine will be that there shall 
be no colonial dependencies in North Amer- 
ica on any European power. This will be 



[154 The ^European War 

intelligible, clear cut, and reach to the root 
of the matter. Its realization, without the 
employment of force by us, will, however, 
be attained only by Canada^s being brought 
through the discouragement of defeat in this 
present war to the consciousness of the un- 
American nature of her present adventure 
and its dangers to the independence and wel- 
fare of North America. These are the 
things which we should consider now. They 
are the things which we will consider when 
we emerge from the stage of emotion and 
advance Into the stage of reflection. 



CHAPTER V 

THE AUSTRO-HUNGARIAN EMPIRE AND THE 
CRIME AT SARAJEVO 

T N the first chapter of this work I com- 
pared the assassination of the heir to 
the Hapsburg Throne with the supposed 
assassination of a Vice-President of these 
United States. The comparison proves 
more, however, than was there claimed for 
it. It is one thing to murder the Vice- 
President or even the President of a Re- 
public, but a far more serious thing to murder 
the dynastic successor to a throne, especially 
when the purpose is manifest to destroy the 
dynasty itself. It may, indeed, be true that 
the Vice-President or the President of the 
Republic may be far more worthy individ- 
ually, both as to intelligence, character, and 
capacity, than the Crown Prince, and it may 
be that the Republic is a higher form of 
political organization than the Monarchy, 

I5S 



156 The 'European War 

but this IS not at all the question here in- 
volved. The question is as to the effect of 
such a catastrophe upon the security and ex- 
istence of the state concerned. 

The Republic has not only a law of suc- 
cession to the office of Its chief magistracy, 
but a law of election for the creation of a 
new chief Magistrate. The Monarchy, 
however, has only the former. The death 
of all those persons qualified by the law of 
succession to succeed to the powers of the 
throne brings the state face to face with a 
crisis for the solution of which its Constitu- 
tion makes no adequate provision, because 
a dynasty is an historical product. It grows 
with the development of the state from little 
beginnings. Its roots reach out in every di- 
rection. Its official powers are intertwined 
with its rights to property. With the pros- 
perity of the state it prospers, and it suffers 
with the adversities of the state. It gives 
its name to the institutions and monuments of 
the state, to Its cities and highways and 
streets and bridges. Its deeds of glory and 



The Austro-Hungarian Empire 157 

victory are interlaced with the state's ad- 
vancement and Its defeats with the state's 
decline. 

All this Is peculiarly true of the Hapsburg 
Dynasty and the Austro-Hungarlan Empire. 
Our earliest historical knowledge of the 
Hapsburgers Is furnished us by deeds of 
gifts made by them to pious purposes, dated 
In the year 1099. The donor In these, one 
Count Werner of Hapsburg, seems to have 
been a wealthy Swablan gentleman, nephew 
of Bishop Werner of Strasburg, the builder 
of the castle occupied by Count Werner, a 
gentleman of high Ideals and philanthropic 
turn. The Castle Hapsburg was located on 
the river Aar some miles north of the present 
city of Lucerne In Switzerland, and It was 
from this centre that the power and posses- 
sions of the Hapsburgers spread east, west, 
north, and south. The Hapsburgers seem to 
have been favorites with the Roman-German 
Emperors of the Swablan House, Frederick 
Barbarossa and Frederick 11^ and received 
from these Emperors lands and offices. In 



158 The ■European War 

the early part of the thirteenth century, 
Albert, called the Wise, of Hapsburg, mar- 
ried a relative of the Emperor Frederick II, 
and the son of this marriage, Rudolf, became 
German King and Roman-German Emperor. 
From this position he was able to add the 
Margravates of Austria, Carinthia, Car- 
nlola, and Styria to his patrimonial posses- 
sions, and although the imperial-royal power 
passed for a time out of Hapsburg hands, 
they were, and continued to be, the chief 
family within the Roman-German Empire. 
In 1437 Albert 11, of Hapsburg, wrested the 
crowns of both Bohemia and Hungary from 
the Emperor SIgismund and the next year 
became Roman-German Emperor, which 
great office now remained in the hands of 
the Hapsburgers down to 1806, when the 
Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation 
was destroyed by Napoleon. The Haps- 
burgers then assumed the title of Emperors 
of Austria and proceeded to organize the 
political system now known as the Austro- 
Hungarlan Empire. 



The Austro-Hungarian Empire 159 

Out of how many elements, homogeneous, 
quasi-homogeneous, and heterogeneous, this 
state body has been composed and what the 
work of the Hapsburg Dynasty has been in 
welding them and in holding them together 
may be in some degree concluded from the 
titles of the Hapsburg Emperor. He is 
Emperor of Austria; King of Hungary, Bo- 
hemia, Dalmatia, Croatia, Slavonia, Galicia, 
and Lodomeria; Archduke of Austria; 
Grand Duke of Krakau; Duke of Salzburg, 
Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, Bukowina, Up- 
per and Lower Silicia, Auschwitz and Zator, 
Teschen, Friaul, Ragusa, and Zara; Prince 
of Siebenbiirgen, Trent and Brixen; Mar- 
grave of Moravia, Upper and Lower 
Lusatia and Istria; Count of Hapsburg, 
Tyrol, Kyburg, Gorz, Gradisca, Hohenembs, 
Feldkirch, Bregenz and Sonnenberg; Lord 
of Triest and Cattaro. I think I have 
omitted some and I know that I have not 
invented any. 

It has been a prodigious work for the 
Hapsburg Dynasty to mould the Austro- 



i6o The European War 

Hungarian Empire from these elements and 
It Is a really wonderful product of unity In 
diversity which this Dynasty has wrought. 
Instead of beating down all local Independ- 
ence and obliterating all racial differences as 
the French Monarchy did, for example, In 
Its development, the Hapsburg Dynasty has 
preserved a sphere of local Independence 
and of racial diversity and has sought to 
reach down to fundamental principles In 
rights and policies upon which men of 
different race and religion can stand, and 
live In peace together. 

If I should be asked to define the political 
system of the Austro-Hungarlan Empire In 
a single sentence, I would call it a confeder- 
ation of two States each with federal govern- 
ment. Austria Is a State composed of 
seventeen autonomous Provinces. Each one 
of these Provinces has Its own legislature 
elected by the voters and exercising all legis- 
lative power not reserved by the written 
Constitution to the Relchrath, the national 
legislature. The laws of the provinces are 



The Austro-Hungarian Empire i6i 

executed by Crown appointees. The national 
legislature, the lower house of which is cho- 
sen by manhood suffrage of all citizens over 
twenty-four years of age, exercises the powers 
vested in it by the written Constitution. 

Hungary is a federal union of two States, 
Hungary proper and the State of Croatia- 
Slavonla-Dalmatia. Each one of these 
States has its own legislature, and this 
body, the members of the lower house of 
which are chosen by suffrage slightly re- 
moved by a very small tax qualification from 
the manhood suffrage of all citizens over 
twenty years of age, makes local laws. In 
order to form a national legislature for the 
two States in union a certain number of rep- 
resentatives from Croatia-Slavonia-Dalmatia 
sit in the legislature for Hungary proper. 
The laws of the two States separately are 
executed by the King of Hungary and his 
appointees, as also the laws of the Union. 

These two States with federal Govern- 
ments are then brought together in the Con- 
federation, entitled the Austro-Hungarlan 



1 62 The 'European War 

Empire. The bonds which hold them to- 
gether are, first and most important, the 
Hapsburg Dynasty, whose head is Emperor, 
King, Archduke, Grand Duke, Prince, Mar- 
grave, Count, and Lord in all the different 
parts of the complex organization, and 
second, the House of Delegations, which is 
composed of an equal number of persons 
chosen by the National legislatures of 
Austria and of Hungary-Croatia. This Con- 
federate Government has control of the 
Foreign Affairs, and the Army and Navy of 
the whole Austro-Hungarian Empire and 
of the finances In so far as they are related to 
these subjects. Finally, Bosnia-Herzegovina 
is a territory of the Austro-Hungarian Em- 
pire, with Its own legislature for local 
affairs, but without any representation in 
either the National Legislature of Austria 
or that of Hungary-Croatia. 

I consider the Austro-Hungarian Empire 
as about the most Interesting experiment In 
the political science of the twentieth century. 
The nineteenth century has given us the na- 



The AustrO'Hungarian Empire 163 

tional state based largely upon unity of race, 
language and custom. While the system of 
national states related to each other only 
through treaty, international law, and di- 
plomacy, is a vast advance over the system 
of universal empire, there still remains the 
danger of too great particularism, if every 
race and linguistic idiom is to be regarded as 
the proper foundation of a separate and 
sovereign state. There still remains the 
problem, therefore, of bringing together dif- 
ferent races or fragments of different races 
and bodies of men of different tongues, in- 
habiting naturally connected territory, into 
a political and governmental union, which 
shall be free enough to preserve valuable 
race differences, but which shall go down 
deep enough in universal human nature to 
find a foundation of principle broad enough 
for men of different races to stand upon and 
feel at home upon, and thus to develop a 
nationality in ideals of a profounder sort 
than that resting upon race or language, one 
approaching nearer to the universal human. 



164 The European War 

No great state In Europe has addressed 
itself so assiduously and sincerely to the 
solution of this great problem as the Austro- 
Hungarlan Empire. It has brought together 
German, Magyar, Czech, Pole, Slovack, 
Moravian, Ruthenian, Croatian, Ruman, 
Serb, Italian, and Lodin, both Christian and 
Mohammedan, and for a full half-century 
held them together In the bonds of a peaceful 
empire. And It has done this not by the 
domination of one race over the others, but 
by a system which leaves to each race its 
language and local customs, and secures to 
each its due representation in the State and 
Imperial Governments, and which seeks to 
find principles of union so fundamentally 
human that all races may feel their national 
ideals and aspirations fulfilled under them. 

This is what the British Chancellor of the 
Exchequer calls a "ramshackle'* empire. I 
have no doubt it appears so to a man accus- 
tomed to see the British Empire governed 
by a handful of men seated in Downing 
street, London, who receive their authority 



The Austro-Hungarian Empire 165 

from a body In which only forty-five millions 
of men, Inhabiting one hundred and twenty 
thousand square miles of territory, out of 
the Rve hundred millions of men, occupying 
the thirteen millions of square miles of terri- 
tory of the British Empire, have any repre- 
sentation at all. But it is quite evident that 
this high British official has no appreciation 
or even conception at all of the great prob- 
lem of race reconciliation In the bonds of a 
peaceful Empire, which Austria-Hungary has 
labored so honestly and sincerely to solve, 
and to the solution of which it has come 
nearer than any other great state in Europe. 
And In this great work the Hapsburg 
Dynasty has played the leading part. I have 
often heard it said that the Emperor Francis 
Joseph Is the only man in all Austria-Hun- 
gary, who can speak to every subject of the 
Empire In his own tongue. Through mis- 
fortune, suffering, and sorrow, frequently 
misunderstood, and at times abused and 
maligned, mediating, compromising, conced- 
ing, yielding, and sacrificing, this Grand Old 



i66 The European War 

Man has worked on for more than sixty-five 
years to establish justice and harmony 
between the races and tongues and religions 
of his Empire, and no higher testimony to 
the success of his efforts, and those of his 
House, could be given than the united up- 
rising of these races in this war for the 
defense of the integrity of the Empire and 
the protection of the Dynasty which has been 
its creator and continues to be its chief 
cementing bond. 

Only in the light of these facts and con- 
siderations can we fully appreciate the 
magnitude of the crime at Sarajevo as one 
involving, In the highest degree, not only the 
honor but the very existence of the Austro- 
Hungarian Empire. 



CHAPTER VI 

BELGIAN NEUTRALITY* 

Q O much has been said about Belgian 
neutrality, so much assumed, and it has 
been such a stumbling block in the way of 
any real and comprehensive understanding 
of the causes and purposes of the great 
European catastrophe, that it may be well 
to examine the basis of it and endeavor to 
get an exact idea of its scope and obligation. 
Of course, we are considering here the 
question of guaranteed neutrality, not the 
ordinary neutrality enjoyed by all states not 
at war, when some states are at war; the 
difference between ordinary neutrality and 
guaranteed neutrality being that no state is 
under any obligation to defend the ordinary 
neutrality of any other state against infringe- 

* This chapter and " The German Emperor " (chapter 
8), appeared originally in the New York Times, and are 
reprinted here bj the courtesy of that journal. 

167 



1 68 The European War 

ment by a belligerent, and no belligerent is 
under any specific obligation to observe it. 
Guaranteed neutrality, is, therefore, purely 
a question of specific agreement between 
states. 

On the 19th day of April, 1839, Belgium 
and Holland, which, from 18 15 to 1830, 
had formed the United Kingdom of The 
Netherlands, signed a treaty of separation 
from, and independence of, each other. It 
is in this treaty that the original pledge of ^ 
Belgian neutrality is to be found. This 
clause of the treaty reads: ''Belgium in the 
limits above described shall form an inde- 
pendent neutral state and shall be bound to 
observe the same neutrality toward all other 
states.'' On the same day and at the same 
place, London, a treaty, known in the history 
of diplomacy as the Quintuple Treaty, was 
signed by Great Britain, France, Prussia, 
Austria, and Russia, approving and adopting 
the treaty between Belgium and Holland. 
A little later. May 11, the German Con- 
federation, of which both Austria and 



Belgian Neutrality 169 

Prussia were members, also ratified this 
treaty. 

In the year 1866 the German Confed- 
eration was dissolved by the war between 
Austria and Prussia, occasioned by the 
Schleswig-Holsteih question. In 1867 the 
North German Union was formed, of which 
Prussia was the leading State, while Austria 
and the German States south of the River 
Main were left out of it altogether. Did 
these changes render the guarantees of the 
treaty of 1839 obsolete and thereby abro- 
gate them, or at least weaken them and 
make them an uncertain reliance? The test 
of this came in the year 1870, at the begin- 
ning of hostilities between France and the 
North German Union. Great Britain, the 
power most interested in the maintenance of 
Belgian neutrality, seems to have had con- 
siderable apprehension about it. Mr. Glad- 
stone, then Prime Minister, said in the 
House of Commons : " I am not able to sub- 
scribe to the doctrine of those who have held 
in this House what plainly amounts to an 



170 The European War 

assertion that the simple fact of the existence 
of a guarantee is binding on every party to 
it, irrespective altogether of the particular 
position in which it may find itself when the 
occasion for acting on the guarantee arises." 
Proceeding upon this view, the British 
Government then sought and procured from 
the French Government and from the Gov- 
ernment of the North German Union sep- 
arate but identical treaties guaranteeing with 
the British Government the neutrality of 
Belgium during the period of the war between 
France and the North German Union, the 
so-called Franco-Prussian war, which had 
just broken out, and for one year from the 
date of its termination. In these treaties it 
is also to be remarked that Great Britain 
limited the possible operation of her military 
forces in maintaining the neutrality of Bel- 
gium to the territory of the state of Belgium. 
These treaties expired in the year 1872, and 
the present German Empire has never signed 
any treaty guaranteeing the neutrality of 
Belgium. 



■>y*o 'f*^^ 



Belgian Neutrality 171 



/ 



Moreover, between 1872 and 19 14 Bel- 
gium became what Is now termed a world 
power; that is, it reached a population of 
nearly 8,000,000 people; it had a well- 
organized, well-equipped army of over 200,- 
000 men and powerful fortifications for its 
own defense ; it had acquired and was holding 
colonies covering 1,000,000 square miles of 
territory, inhabited by 15,000,000 men, and 
it had active commerce, mediated by its own 
marine, with many, If not all, parts of the 
world. Now, these things are not at all 
compatible in principle with a specially 
guaranteed neutrality of the state which 
possesses them. The state which possesses 
them has grown out of its swaddling clothes, 
has arrived at the age and condition of 
maturity and self-protection, and has passed 
the age when specially guaranteed neutrality 
is natural. 

From all these considerations, I think it 
extremely doubtful whether, on the first day 
of August, 19 14, Belgium should have been 
considered as possessing any other kind 



172 The ^European War 

of neutrality than the ordinary neutrality 
enjoyed by all states not at war, when some 
states are at war. In fact, it remains to be 
seen whether Belgium itself had not forfeited 
the privilege of this ordinary neutrality 
before a single German soldier had placed 
foot on Belgian soil. A few months ago I 
received a letter from one of the most prom- 
inent professors In the University of Berlin, 
who Is also In close contact with the Prussian 
Ministry of Education, a man in whose 
veracity I place perfect confidence, having 
known him well for ten years. He wrote: 
" Our Invasion of Belgium was prompted in 
part by the fact that we had convincing proof 
that there were French soldiers already In 
Belgium, and that Belgium had agreed to 
allow the French Army to pass over Its soil 
in case of a war between France and us." 
Moreover, In the British "White Paper" 
Itself, No. 122, Is to be found a dispatch 
from the British Ambassador In Berlin, Sir 
E. Goschen, to Sir Edward Grey, containing 
these words: "It appears from what he 



Belgian Neutrality 173 

[the German Secretary of Foreign Affiairs] 
said that the German Government consider 
that certain hostile acts have already been 
committed by Belgium/' The date of this 
dispatch is July 31, days before the Germans 
entered Belgium. 

But placing these two things entirely 
aside, as well as the new evidence found in 
the archives at Brussels, that Belgium had 
by her agreements with Great Britain for- 
feited every claim to neutrality in case of a 
war between Germany and Great Britain, evi- 
dence the genuineness of which has now been 
acknowledged by the British Government, 
I find in the British "White Paper" itself. 
No. 123, not only ample justification, but 
absolute necessity, from a military point of 
view, for a German army advancing against 
France, not only to pass through Belgium, 
but to occupy Belgium. This number of the 
"White Paper" is a communication dated 
August I from Sir Edward Grey to Sir E. 
Goschen, British Ambassador in Berlin. In 
it Sir Edward Grey informed Sir E. Goschen 



174 ^^^ European War 

that the German Ambassador in London 
asked him "whether, if Germany gave a 
promise not to viblate Belgium neutrality, 
we. Great Britain, would remain neutral," 
and that he [Grey] replied that he "could 
not say that," that he did not think Great 
Britain " could give a promise of neutrality 
on that condition alone ;" further, Sir Edward 
Grey says: "The Ambassador pressed me 
as to whether I could not formulate condi- 
tions on which we would remain neutral. 
He even suggested that the integrity of 
France and her colonies might be guaranteed. 
I said that I felt obliged to refuse definitely 
any promise to remain neutral on similar 
terms, and I could only say that we must 
keep our hands free." 

After this Sir Edward Grey declared in 
Parliament, according to newspaper reports, 
that Great Britain stood, as to Belgian neu- 
trality, on the same ground as in 1870. With 
all due respect, I cannot so understand it. In 
1870 Great Britain remained neutral in a 
war between the North German Union 



Belgian Neutrality 175 

and France, and, with the North Ger- 
man Union, guaranteed Belgium against 
invasion by France, and, with France, guar- 
anteed Belgium against Invasion by the 
North German Union. On August i, 19 14, 
the German Empire asked Great Britain to 
do virtually the same thing, and Great /^>»^'-^*^<^ ^^ 
Britain refused. It is, therefore, Germany ^ . \ 

who stood in 19 14 on the same ground, with .^;^,„.^ AtJ^i 
regard to Belgian neutrality, as she did in 
1870, and it Is Great Britain who shifted her 
position and virtually gave notice that she 
herself would become a belligerent. It was 
this notice served by Sir Edward Grey on 
the German Ambassador in London on 
August I, 19 14, which made the occupation 
of Belgium an absolute military necessity to 
the safety of the German armies advancing 
against France. Otherwise they would, so 
far as the wit of man could divine, have left 
their right flank exposed to the advance of a 
British army through Belgium, and there 
certainly was no German commander so 
absolutely bereft of all military knowledge 



176 The European War 

or instinct as to have committed so patent 
an error. 

Belgium has Great Britain to thank for 
every drop of blood shed by her people, and 
every franc of damage inflicted within her 
territory during this war. With a million 
of German soldiers on her eastern border 
demanding unhindered passage through one 
end of her territory, under the pledge of 
guarding her independence and Integrity and 
reimbursing every franc of damage, and no 
British force nearer than Dover, across the 
Channel, it was one of the most inconsid- 
erate, reckless, and selfish acts ever com- 
mitted by a great power when Sir Edward 
Grey directed, as Is stated In No. 155 of the <^a 
British "White Paper," the British Envoy 
in Brussels to Inform the " Belgian Govern- 
ment that if pressure is applied to them by 
Germany to induce them to depart from 
neutrality, his Majesty's Government expect$ 
that they will resist by any means in their 
power." 

It is plain enough that Great Britain was 



Belgian Neutrality 177 

not thinking so much of protecting Belgium 
as of Belgium protecting her, until she could 
prepare to attack Germany in concert with 
Russia and France. She was willing to let 
Belgium, yea almost to command Belgium, 
to take the fearful risk of complete destruc- 
tion in order that she might gain a little time 
in perfecting the cooperation of Russia and 
France with herself for the crushing of Ger- 
many, and in order to hold the public opinion 
of neutral powers, specially of the United 
States of America, in leash under the chiv- 
alrous issue of protecting a weaker country, 
which she has done little or nothing to pro- 
tect, but which she could have effectively 
protected by simply remaining neutral herself. 
We Americans have been greatly confused 
in mind in regard to the issues of this war. 
We have confounded causes and occasions 
and purposes and incidents until it has 
become almost impossible for any consider- 
able number of us to form a sound and 
correct judgment in regard to it. But we 
shall emerge from that nebulous condition. 



178 The ^European War 

We are beginning to see more clearly now, 
and it would not surprise me greatly if the 
means used for producing our confusion 
would some day come back, if not to plague 
the consciences, at least to foil the purposes, 
of their inventors. 



CHAPTER VII 

THE EXPORT OF ARMS AND MUNITIONS TO 
BELLIGERENTS 

^T^ O one viewing the subject from a purely 
scientific and objective standpoint, the 
claim that an embargo by a neutral govern- 
ment of the sale of arms and munitions of 
war to belligerents is, under any circum- 
stances or conditions, a violation of neutrality 
seems either sophistical or hypocritical and 
in either case unpatriotic. It is quite true 
that the inconsistency in principle still exists 
that a neutral government may not furnish 
nor allow its subjects to furnish ships of war 
to belligerents, but may allow its subjects 
to furnish the guns and munitions which give 
to vessels their formidable character as ships 
of war. But the permission to its subjects of 
furnishing arms and munitions to belligerents 
is the right of the neutral government, not 

179 



i8o The ^European War 

the duty of the neutral government to the 
belligerent. 

The neutral government may permit or 
may not permit, as it may freely choose. Its 
duty is, that after having made its choice it 
must accord parity of treatment to all 
belligerents. That is, if it refuses to permit 
sales to one it must refuse to all and if it 
allows them to one it must allow them to 
all, in like manner and extent. Should it 
happen that ^conditions exist, or come to 
exist, independent of the power or the act 
of the neutral government, whereby any 
belligerent does not, or even cannot, make 
use of Jiis opportunity to procure from the 
neutral, the neutral government is under no 
legal obligation to take any notice of this. 
If it be ready and willing to allow its sub- 
jects to furnish such belligerent, it will have 
discharged its duty of parity of treatment. 

It is entirely free, however, to discontinue 
allowing its subjects to furnish to both, and 
neither has any right to complain if it does; 
for, as I have said, the permitting or the 



The Export of Arms i8l 

forbidding Its subjects to furnish is the right 
of the neutral government to be exercised 
by it at its own discretion and not a duty 
to the belligerent, to be rendered to him at 
his behest. Were this latter true, then the 
neutral would no longer be a free state, no 
longer sovereign. It would, in case of obli- 
gation to permit, be bound to^ the policy 
of the belligerent, the war policy of the* 
belligerent. 

The argument that where only one bellig- 
erent cati take advantage of the permission 
to procure, the neutral government must 
continue to allow Its subjects to furnish, 
on the ground that it would otherwise be 
depriving the belligerent of an advantage 
which the belligerent himself had won, 
or on the ground that it would thereby 
assist the other belligerent, is manifest 
sophistry and, if advanced by the neutral, 
is only a pretext for favoring the one bellig- 
erent. It Is one of the most fundamental 
rules of international law that indirect con- 
sequences are not to be taken into account. 



i82 The ^European War 

It was this principle which prevented us 
from getting anything out of Great Britain 
at Geneva in 1872, except the reimburse- 
ment of direct private losses. The hundred- 
fold greater indirect losses have never been 
atoned for in the slightest degree. 

If by any twist of logic, ceasing to help 
one belligerent directly can be held to be 
helping the other, then this latter assistance 
is indirect and is not taken into account in 
diplomatic or international reasoning or acts. 
And when we go over into the domain of 
morals, certainly, if there are two courses 
legally open to the neutral, one of which 
helps directly only one of the belligerents 
but the other helps both directly or neither, 
the neutral should follow the latter course. 

At the present time and under present con- 
ditions only Great Britain and her allies can 
profit by our government's permitting the 
free sale of arms and munitions. These 
conditions are not of our government's mak- 
ing, and it does not in law need to take any 
notice of them, provided it be ready and 



The Export of Arms 183 

willing to allow Great Britain's enemies to be 
furnished in the same degree and measure. 
It is surely difficult to determine whether pri- 
vate parties are ready and willing to furnish 
both belligerents or not until the actual test 
should be made and made in each separate 
case. The majority of those now furnishing 
arms and munitions to Great Britain and her 
allies, under the permission of this govern- 
ment, are undoubtedly doing so, purely and 
simply, for the dollars there are in it. Such 
persons would undoubtedly furnish them to 
the enemies of Great Britain, or to His 
Satanic Majesty himself, if the opportunity 
offered and the payments were satisfactory. 
There are some who, besides the dollar 
inducement, desire to assist Great Britain and 
her allies against their enemies, and would 
probably find some way of avoiding the sale 
of arms and munitions to such enemies should 
the occasion arise. This would be unneutral, 
but how could it be dealt with? 

Still further, there are unquestionably a 
few who think that by furnishing arms and 



184 The ^European War 

munitions to Great Britain and her allies 
alone the war may be shortened. Such per- 
sons also would probably find some way to 
avoid furnishing the enemies of Great Britain 
with the means of warfare, which, as I have 
said, would be unneutral indeed, but difficult, 
if not impossible, to deal with. 

Finally, there is one man, so far as I know 
only one, who has assumed the firm, cour- 
ageous, unselfish, and humane stand that he 
and his company will take no advantage of 
the permission of our Government to furnish 
arms and munitions to the belligerents in 
this war and has distinctly and definitely re- 
fused to fill any orders offered him. This 
man is Charles R. Bryson, President of the 
Electro-Steel Company of Pittsburgh, Penn- 
sylvania. Mr. Bryson says: 

We believe that the time is at hand when any 
firm or individual who accepts a contract to fur- 
ther add to the horrible slaughter now going on in 
Europe will do so to his own disgrace. 

These words should be printed in gold 
and in letters large enough and upon a tower 



The Export of Arms 185 

high enough to be seen all over these United 
States. Mr. Bryson is right not only from 
the point of view of highest humanitarian- 
ism, but from every other point of view, 
practical and legal. It will bring no perma- 
nent gain to this country in dollars and cents 
to furnish the means for killing and maiming 
the men and destroying the property of Eu- 
rope, thus lessening and crippling our legiti- 
mate trade with Europe in times of peace. 
It will not secure victory for Great Britain 
and her allies nor enable them to shorten 
the war that they alone can take advantage 
of the permission of our government to 
procure arms and munitions here, while their 
enemies cannot. We may reasonably con- 
clude that Germany and her allies will not 
be able to invade the British Islands, and 
will not probably undertake to go much 
further into Russia, but they will, in all prob- 
ability, hold the line substantially as now 
fixed so long as they desire, and there is no 
power on the face of the earth sufficient 
to crush the German Empire. At the begin- 



1 86 The European War 

ning of the War in 1756, Frederick the 
Great had fivt millions of souls to draw from 
and his enemies one hundred millions, and 
yet he waged war against them seven years 
and came out victorious. Today, the Ger- 
man Empire has alone seventy millions of 
souls to draw from and with its allies one 
hundred and sixty millions, while its enemies 
have all together not really three hundred 
millions of equal capacity. If Prussia could 
triumph over twenty to one in 1763, cannot 
that same Prussia, better prepared, more 
united and far more capable, hold her own 
against less than two to one in 19 15? No, 
the furnishing of arms and munitions of war 
to Great Britain and her allies by the people 
of the United States will only prolong the 
war without altering the final result. 

I verily believe that, except for that aid, 
the war would be very near its end, if not 
practically over, today; and I agree with 
Mr. Bryson that any man in this country who 
furnishes further the implements of death 
and destruction to the belligerents in this war 



The Export of Arms 187 

will do so, "to his own disgrace.'* Mr. 
Bryson is also entirely right in assuming that 
he and his company do not violate the neu- 
trality of the country in refusing to furnish 
arms and munitions of war to belligerents 
under any circumstances or conditions, nor 
would his government do so in forbidding 
them to be furnished. The contrary view 
is not only false as having no basis in interna- 
tional law, not only unpatriotic as subordi- 
nating the policy of our country to the war 
policy of a foreign country, but it is promo- 
tive of hypocrisy as turning the scales be- 
tween conscience and dollars now balancing 
in the minds of many fairly honest men. 

If men wish to sell arms and munitions of 
war to the belligerents for the dollars that 
are in it, let them say so. They have the 
legal right to do so, so long as the govern- 
ment permits it. If they wish to do this in 
order to help one belligerent against another, 
let them say so, for while this appears un- 
neutral, there is no way to reach it, so long 
as our own government permits it. But let 



1 88 The ^European War 

us not encourage men to take refuge under 
the view that they must do so to preserve 
neutrality for that is false, unpatriotic, and 
hypocritical. Neither the individual nor the 
nation nor the government can, in the eye 
of God or in the eye of history, escape the 
guilt of having aided in the prolongation of 
this terrible war by seeking shelter under any 
such flimsy pretext, any such patent subter- 
fuge. 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE GERMAN EMPEROR 

TT is often said by historians that no truly 
great man is ever really understood by 
the generation, and in the age, for which he 
labors. Many instances of the truth of this 
statement can be easily cited. Two of the 
most flagrant have come within the range of 
my own personal experience. The first was 
the character of Abraham Lincoln as de- 
picted by the British press of 1860-64 and 
as conceived by the British public opinion of 
that era. Mr. Henry Adams, son and pri- 
vate secretary of Mr. Charles Francis 
Adams, our Minister Plenipotentiary to 
Great Britain during that critical era in our 
history, writes in that fascinating book of his 
entitled The Education of Henry J dams: 

London was altogether beside itself on one 
point, in especial; it created a nightmare of its 

189 



190 The ^European War 

own, and gave it the shape of Abraham Lincoln. 
Behind this it placed another demon, if possible 
more devilish, and called it Mr. Seward. In regard 
to these two men English society seemed demented. 
Defense was useless; explanation was vain. One 
could only let the passion exhaust itself. One's best 
friends were as unreasonable as enemies, for the 
belief in poor Mr. Lincoln's brutality and Seward's 
ferocity became a dogma of popular faith. 

Adams relates further that the last time 
he saw Thackeray at Christmas of 1863 they 
spoke of their mutual friend, Mrs. Frank 
Hampton of South Carolina, whom Thack- 
eray had portrayed as Ethel Newcome, and 
who had recently passed away from life. 
Thackeray had read in the British papers 
that her parents had been prevented by the 
Federal soldiers from passing through the 
lines to see her on her death-bed. Adams 
writes : 

In speaking of it Thackeray's voice trembled and 
his eyes filled with tears. The coarse cruelty of 
Lincoln and his hirelings was notorious. He never 
doubted that the Federals made a business of 



The German Emperor 191 



harrowing the tenderest feelings of women — partic- 
ularly of women — -in order to punish their oppo- 
nents. On quite insufficient evidence he burst into 
reproach. Had he (Adams) carried in his pocket 
the proofs that the reproach was unjust, he would 
have gained nothing by showing them. At that 
moment Thackeray, and all London society with 
him, needed the nervous relief of expressing emo- 
tions; for if Mr. Lincoln was not what they said 
he was, what were they? 

Mr. Lincoln sent over our most skillful 
politician, Thurlow Weed, and our most able 
constitutional lawyer, William M. Evarts, 
and later our most brilliant orator, Henry 
Ward Beecher, followed, for the purpose of 
bringing the British people to their senses 
and correcting British opinion, but all to little 
purpose. Gettysburg and VIcksburg did far 
more toward modifying that opinion than the 
persuasiveness of Weed, the logic of Evarts, 
or the eloquence of Beecher, and It took 
Chattanooga, the March to the Sea, and Ap- 
pomattox to dispel the Illusion entirely. 

Today we are laboring under a no less 
singular delusion than were the English in 



192 The European War 

1862. The conception prevailing in Eng- 
land and In this country concerning the phys- 
ical, mental, and moral make-up of the 
German Emperor Is the monumental carica- 
ture of biographical literature. I have had 
the privilege of his personal acquaintance 
now for nearly ten years. I have been 
brought Into contact with him in many 
different ways and under many varying con- 
ditions ; at Court and State functions, at uni- 
versity ceremonies and celebrations, at his 
table, and by his fireside surrounded by his 
family, when in the midst of his officials, 
his men of science, and personal friends, and, 
more instructive than all, alone in the Im- 
perial home in Berlin and Potsdam and In 
the castle and forest at Wilhelmshohe. With 
all this experience, with all this opportunity 
for observation at close range, I am hardly 
able to recognize a single characteristic 
usually attributed to him by the British and 
American press of today. 

In the first place, the Emperor is an im- 
pressive man physically. He Is not a giant 



The German Emperor 193 

in stature, but a man of medium size, great 
strength and endurance, and of agile and 
graceful movement. He looks every inch a 
leader of men. His fine gray-blue eyes are 
peculiarly fascinating. I saw him once 
seated beside his uncle, King Edward vii., 
and the contrast was very striking, and 
greatly in his favor. 

In the second place, the Emperor is an 
exceedingly intelligent and highly cultivated 
man. His mental processes are swift, but 
they go also very deep. He is a searching 
inquirer, and questions and listens more than 
he talks. His fund of knowledge is immense 
and sometimes astonishing. He manifests 
interest in everything, even to the smallest 
detail, which can have any bearing upon 
human improvement. I remember a half- 
hour's conversation with him once over a 
cupping-glass, which he had gotten from an 
excavation in the Roman ruin called the Saal- 
burg, near Homburg. 

He always appeared to me most deeply 
concerned with the arts of peace. I have 



194 The ^European War 

never heard him speak much of war, and 
then always with abhorrence, nor much of 
military matters; but improved agriculture, 
invention, and manufacture, and especially 
commerce and education in all their ramifica- 
tions were the chief subjects of his thought 
and conversation. I have had the privilege 
of association with many highly intelligent 
and profoundly learned men, but I have 
never acquired as much knowledge, In the 
same time, from any man whom I have ever 
met, as from the German Emperor. And 
yet, with all this real superiority of mind 
and education, his deference to the opinions 
of others Is remarkable. Arrogance is one 
of the qualities most often attributed to him, 
but he is the only ruler I ever saw In whom 
there appeared to be absolutely no arro- 
gance. He meets you as man meets man 
and makes you feel that you are required to 
yield to nothing but the better reason. 

In the third place, the Emperor impressed 
me as a man of heart, of warm affections and 
of great consideration for the feelings and 



The German Emperor 195 



well-being of others. He can not, at least 
does not, conceal his reverence for, and de- 
votion to, the Empress, or his love for his 
children, or his attachment to his friends. 
He always speaks of Queen Victoria and of 
the Empress Friedrich with the greatest 
veneration, and once when speaking to me of 
an old American friend who had turned upon 
him, he said that it was difficult for him to 
give up an old friend, right or wrong, and 
impossible when he believed him to be in the 
right. His manifest respect and affection for 
his old and tried officials, such as Lucanus 
and zu Eulenburg and von Studt and Beseler 
and Althoff, give strong evidence of the 
warmth and depth of his nature. His con- 
sideration for Americans, especially, has 
always been remarkable. It was at his sug- 
gestion that the exchange of educators be- 
tween the universities of Germany and of 
the United States was established, and it 
has been his custom to be present at the 
opening lecture of each new incumbent of 
these positions at the University of Berlin, 



196 The European War^ 

and to greet him and welcome him to his 
work. He is also the first to extend to these 
foreign educators hospitality and social 
attention. 

To any one who has experienced his hearty 
welcome to his land and his home, the asser- 
tion that he is arrogant and autocratic is so 
far away from truth as to be ludicrous. 
Again I must say that I have never met a 
ruler, in monarchy or republic, in whom gen- 
uine democratic geniality was a so predomi- 
nant characteristic. 

But the characteristic of the Emperor 
which struck me most forcibly is his pro- 
found sense of duty and his readiness for 
self-sacrifice for the welfare of his country. 
This is a general German trait. It is the 
most admirable side of German nature. And 
the Emperor is, in this respect especially, 
their Princeps. I remember sitting beside 
him one day, when one of the ladies of his 
household asked me if I were acquainted 
with a certain wealthy, ultra-fashionable New 
York social leader. I replied, by name only. 



The German Emperor i()j 

She pressed me to know why not more 
nearly, why not personally. And to this I 
replied that I was not of her class; that I 
could not amuse her, and that I did not ap- 
prove of the frivolous and demoralizing 
example and influence of one so favorably 
circumstanced for doing good. The Em- 
peror had heard the conversation, and he 
promptly said: "You know in Germany we 
do not rate and classify people by their ma- 
terial possessions, but by the importance of 
the service they render to country, culture, 
and civilization." One of his sons once told 
me that from his earliest childhood his father 
had instilled into his mind the lesson that 
devotion to duty and readiness for sacrifice 
were the cardinal virtues of a German, espe- 
cially of a Hohenzollern. His days are 
periods of constant labor and severe dis- 
cipline. He rises early, lives abstemiously, 
and works until far into the night. There 
is no day laborer in his entire Empire who 
gives so many hours per diem to his work. 
His nature is manifestly deeply religious and. 



198 The 'European War 

in every sentence he speaks, evidence of his 
consciousness that the policeman's club can- 
not take the place of religious and moral 
principle is revealed. His frequent appeal 
for Divine aid in the discharge of his duties 
is prompted by the conviction that the 
heavier the duty the more need there is of 
that aid. 

He undoubtedly has an intense desire, 
almost a passion, for the prosperity and 
greatness of his country, but his conception 
of that prosperity and greatness is more 
spiritual and cultural than material and com- 
mercial. More than once have I heard him 
say that he desired to see Germany a wealthy 
country, but only as the result of honest and 
properly requited toil, and that wealth 
acquired by force or fraud was more a curse 
than a blessing, and was destined to go as 
it had come. His conception of the greatness 
of Germany is as a great intellectual and 
moral power rather than anything else. Its 
physical power he values chiefly as the cre- 
ator and maintainer of the conditions neces- 



The German Emperor 199 



sary to the production and influence of this 
higher power. I have often heard him 
express this thought. 

And in spite of this terrible war, the re- 
sponsibility for which is by so many erro- 
neously laid at his door, I firmly believe him 
to be a man of peace. I am absolutely sure 
that he has entered upon this war only under 
the firm conviction that Great Britain, 
France, and Russia have conspired to destroy 
Germany as a world power, and that he is 
simply defending, as he said in his memo- 
rable speech to the Reichstag, the place which 
God had given the Germans to dwell on. 
For seven years I myself have witnessed the 
growth of this conviction in his mind and 
that of the whole German Nation as the evi- 
dences of it have multiplied from year to 
year until at last the fatal hour at Sarajevo 
struck. I firmly believe that there is no soul 
in this wide world upon whom the burden 
and grief of this great catastrophe so heavily 
rest as upon the German Emperor. 

I have heard him declare with the greatest 



200 The European War 

earnestness and solemnity that he considered 
war a dire calamity; that Germany would 
never during his reign wage an offensive war, 
and that he hoped God would spare him 
from the necessity of ever having to conduct 
a defensive war. For years he has been 
conscious that British diplomacy was seeking 
to isolate and crush Germany by an alliance 
of Latin, Slav, and Mongol under British 
direction, and he sought in every way to 
avert it. He visited England himself fre- 
quently. He sent his Ministers of State 
over to cultivate the acquaintance and friend- 
ship of the British Ministers, but rarely 
would the British King go himself to Ger- 
many or send his Ministers to return these 
visits. 

More than once have I heard him say that 
he was most earnestly desirous of close 
friendship between Germany, Great Britain, 
and the United States, and had done, was 
doing, and would continue to do, all in his 
power to promote it, but that while the 
Americans were cordially meeting Germany 



The German Emperor 201 

half way, the British were cold, suspicious, 
and repellent. 

I know that the two things which are giv- 
ing him the deepest pain in this world- 
catastrophe, excepting only the sufferings of 
his own kindred and people, are the enmity 
of Great Britain and the misunderstanding 
of his character, feelings, and purposes in 
America. To remedy the first we here can 
do nothing, but to dispel the second is our 
bounden duty; and I devoutly hope that 
other evidence may prove sufficient to do 
this to the satisfaction of the minds of my 
countrymen than was necessary to convince 
the British nation that the great-hearted 
Abraham Lincoln was not a brute nor the 
urbane William H. Seward a demon of 
ferocity. 



INDEX 



Adams, Charles Francis, 
in Great Britain, 127- 
133, 189-191. 

Administrative Law of 
England, The, 108. 

Algeciras Congress, 64, 

72-74. 

Alsace-Lorraine, reclaimed 
by Germany, 49; helped 
by Germany, 50. 

American, people deceived 
in regard to Germany, 
109; interests in the 
outcome of the Euro- 
pean war, 1 13-154; trade 
and German merchant 
marine, 143, 144; ships 
destroyed by Great Bri- 
tain, 122-132 ; navy, 
125, 126. 

Arms and munitions, ex- 
port of to belligerents, 
179-188. 

Austro-Hungarian empire, 
plots against, 5-n; and 
the Sarajevo crime, 4-17, 
155-166; and the Franco- 
German war, 47. 

Austria-Hungary, rulers 
and government, 155- 
166; union estates, 158- 



166; political system, 
160-166. 

Balkans, and Russian de- 
signs, 2; war with Tur- 
key, 13. 

Balkan League, formed, 
76; attacks Turkey, 76, 

77- 

Beaconsfield, Lord, in the 
Congress at Berlin, 52. 

Beecher, Henry Ward, 
sent to England by Mr. 
Lincoln, 191. 

Belgium, its neutrality, 
and invasion, 38-41 ; 
and the treaty of 1839, 
48 ; land-grabbing, 97 ; 
neutrality of, 167-178; 
separates from Holland, 
168; quintuple treaty, 
168; a world power, 
170, 171 ; invasion by 
Germany, 172; dealings 
with Great Britain, 172, 
173; and the British 
White Paper, 172-176; 
German view of the in- 
vasion, 172, 173. 

Bismarck, in the Congress 
at Berlin, 52; and 



203 



204 



Index 



Russo-German neutral- 
ity, 52; forms alliance 
with Austria-Hungary, 
53; and the Consolida- 
tion of the German era* 
pire, S3; acquires Hel- 
goland, 54. 

Bosnia-Herzegovina, and 
Turkey, 70, 71. 

British Government, 89- 
92. 

British White Paper, 1-44; 
and the invasion of Bel- 
gium, 172-176. 

Bryson, Charles R., re- 
fuses to fill orders for 
munitions of war, 184, 
185. 

Bulgaria, repudiates rule 
of Sultan, 70. 

Canada and the United 
States, 149, 154; rela- 
tions with Great Bri- 
tain, 150-154. 

Civil War, assistance 
given by Germans to 
the North, 1 17-122. 

Colonial dominion, Great 
Britain's, 85-90, no, 
in; Germany's, 97, 98; 
British system of, 142. 

Constantinople, and Rus- 
sia, in 1879, 51, 52, 66", 
and the Balkan war, 77, 



Czar of Russia and Triple 
Entente, 67. 

Destiny, and world prog- 
ress, 81, 83, 93, 109. 

Dreadnaughts, England's, 
90. 

Diplomatic papers ana- 
lyzed, 3, 4. 

Economic system, 84-90. 
Education of Henry 

Adams, The, 189. 
Edward VH, 59, 67, 71. 
Egypt and Great Britain, 

63. 

England, and German/s 
commercial growth, 2 ; 
mobilizes fleet, 33; and 
the neutrality of Bel- 
gium, 36-40, 42; army 
mobilizes, 44; opposes 
France, 45, 47; jealous 
of Germany, 54; appro- 
priates new territory, 56 ; 
and its ducal estates, 
84-88. 

Evarts, William M., sent 
to England by Mr. Lin- 
coln, 191. 

Export of arms and mu- 
nitions to belligerents, 
179-188. 

Fallieres, President, 67. 
Fisheries award, 139, 140. 



Index 



205 



France, and Alsace-Lor- 
raine, 2; the leading 
state of Europe, 45; 
1870 war with Germany, 
46, 49; makes treaty 
with Russia, 55; appro- 
priates territory, 56 ; 
and Morocco, 6z, 64, 72^ 
73; land-grabbing, 97. 

Francis Joseph, Emperor, 
life and influence, 159. 

Franco-Prussian war of 
1870-71, 46. 

Free trade, England and, 
87-89. 

Geneva tribunal, 138. 

German empire, its for- 
mation, 45, 48, so, 53. 

Germany and the Austro- 
Servian trouble, 14-44 ; 
and the neutrality of 
Belgium, z^, z7, 38; 
Faces war with three 
powers, 40; reforms in 
Alsace-Lorraine, 50, 51; 
and colonial expansion, 
53» 54; supports Russia 
in Asia, 55; develop- 
ment in manufacture 
and commerce, 56; lim- 
ited colonial posses- 
sions, 56; opens trade 
with Turkey, 57, 58; 
and Bagdad railroad, 



57; growth of navy, 57; 
and the Morocco ques- 
tion, 6z, 64; defeats 
Entente plans, 71; in- 
terferes to save Turkey, 
78; prepares for emer- 
gency, 79, 80; economic 
and political systems, 
93-99; agriculture, 94, 
95; commerce, 97; mil- 
itarism, 100-104; com-= 
munal and local gov- 
ernment, 104, 105 ; and 
von Treitschke, 106, 
107; and Wagner, 106; 
and Lasker, 107; and 
von Gneist, 107, 108; 
system of national 
states. III; Emperor 
William 139; 'his life 
and character, 189-200 ; 
merchant marine, value 
to United States, 143, 
144; as a governmental 
organization, 145-148 ; 
support to United 
States in war crises, 
1 13-122; and treaties 
with Belgium, 168-178; 
probabilities of success 
in the war, 185, 186; 
war strength, 186; Ger- 
man loyalty to country, 
144, 196. 
German confederation, its 
disrupture, 45. 



2o6 



Index 



Gneist, von, Rudolf, 107, 
108. 

Grant, Ulysses, on the 
claims against Great 
Britain, 134-137; on the 
German government, 
145, 146. 

Great Britain, and Ger- 
many's trade with Tur- 
key, 58, 59; and Rus- 
sian activity in Asia, 59; 
fears Russian advance, 
60; plans growth of 
empire in the East, 60, 
61, 66; offers alliance 
with Germany and Ja- 
pan, 62; treaty with Ja- 
pan, 62; and Egypt, 63; 
and Morocco, 63, 64; 
opposes Russian plans 
in the East, 65, 66', 
backs France in Mo- 
rocco, yz, 74; exclu- 
sive rights in Egypt, 74; 
efforts to weaken the 
Triple Alliance, 75, 76; 
jealous of German trade 
and navy, 80; encour- 
ages Servia to resist 
Austria, 81 ; and France 
to support Russia, 81 ; 
supports France, 81 ; de- 
pendent on colonies, 85- 
90 ; economic system, 
85-90; government, 90- 
94; land-grabbing, 97; 



navalism, endangers 
America and United 
States, 122-133; and the 
United States war 
claims, 134-141 ; de- 
stroys American mer- 
chant marine, 141 ; and 
German commerce, 141 ; 
its government, 164, 
165; and the neutrality 
and invasion of Bel- 
gium, 168-178. 
Grey, Sir Edward, i, 12, 
14, 15; and the Aus- 
tro-Hungarian empire 
and Servia, 13-44; and 
the beginning of the 
war, 41-44, 173-176. 

Hapsburg family, history 
and character, 155-166. 

Helgoland, acquired by 
Germany, 54. 

Hungary, relation to Aus- 
tria, 161, 162. 

India and the Russian ad- 
vance, 60. 

Italy and the Triple Alli- 
ance, 12; and Tripoli, 
12; opposes France, 46, 
47; joins the Triple Al- 
liance, 53 ; occupies 
Tripoli, 75. 

Japan inimical to Ger- 
many, 55, 56. 



Index 



207 



Kiao-chow, Germany in 

China, 56. 
Kreis-ordnung, 104, 105. 

Lasker, Edward, 107. 

Lincoln, Abraham, British 
view of during the Civil 
War, 128, 129, 189-181. 

MacDonald, J. Ramsey, 
denounces Lord Grey, 

43. 

Manufacture and com- 
merce, of Germany, 95, 
96. 

Mason and Slidell, 129, 
130. 

Mensdorff, Count, 14, 15. 

Mexico, and the Huerta 
government, 10. 

Militarism, German, 100- 
104; assistance given by 
to the United States, 
1 13- 122. 

Monroe Doctrine, 148-154. 

Morocco, 62,, 64, 72, 7Z- 

Narodna Odbrana society, 
5. 

Navalism, British, 1 13 ; 
destroys American ship- 
ping, 122- 141. 

Neutral governments, and 
export of munitions of 
war, 179-188. 



Norman, C. H,, and Lord 
Grey, 44- 

North, cause of in Civil 
War would have failed 
without German sup- 
port, 121. 

Northwest Boundary ques- 
tion, 138. 

Occasions of the war of 
1914, 1-44. 

Panther, The, sent to 

Agadir, yz- 
Proximate causes of the 

war, 45-81. 

Revolutionary war, assist- 
ance given by Germans 
to American side, 114- 
116. 

Russia, and the Balkans, 
2; and the Austro-Hun- 
garian-Servian question, 
16-44 ') mobilizes her 
troops, 31, 32; crosses 
German frontier, 34 ; 
and the Franco-German 
war, 46; war with Tur- 
key, SI, 52; turns from 
Germany to France, 52; 
treaty with France, 55; 
obtains Port Arthur, 56; 
moves against Turkey, 
i9I3j 77-79; and the 
French army increase, 



208 



Index 



79; economic and po- 
litical systems, 92; land- 
grabbing, 97 ; perils 
Europe, loi ; plans 
against Turkey, loi ; 
danger in her domi- 
nance, 143. 

San Stefano, treaty of, 

52. 

Sarajevo crime, 4, 13, 80, 
81; and the Austro- 
Hungarian empire, 155- 
166. 

Sazonof and the Entente, 
27, 28. 

Self Government in Eng- 
land, 108. 

Servia and the Sarajevo 
crime, 4-14. 

Seward, Secretary, British 
view of during Civil 
War, 190. 

Southern Confederacy, 
supported by Great Bri- 
tain, 126-132. 

Steuben, Baron von, serv- 
ice to America in the 
Revolution, 115, 116. 

"Three Emperor Alliance," 

51. 
Treaty of Washington, 

137. 
Treitschkc, von, Heinrich, 

105, IQ6k 



Trent afifair, 129, 130. 

Triple Alliance, formed, 
53; and Italy, 12; and 
Triple Entente, 13. 

Triple Entente, 3, 12, 67. 

Tripoli, and the Italian 
expedition, 12 ; occu- 
pied by Italy, 75. 

Turkey, saved by Con- 
gress at Berlin, 52; and 
German trade, 57, 58. 

Underlying causes of the 
war, 82-112. 

United States, and Huerta, 
10; public opinion in 
about the war, 177-178; 
and the export of arms 
and munitions of war, 
179-188; and the "Mon- 
roe Doctrine," 148-154; 
and Canada, 149-154; 
delusion in regard to 
the German Emperor, 
191. 

Wagner, Adolf, 106. 

War, occasions of the 
European, 1-44; proxi- 
mate causes of the, 45- 
81 ; underlying causes 
of the European, 82-112. 

Washington, George, his 
bodyguard of Germans, 
115. 



Index 



209 



Weed, Thurlow, sent to 
England by Mr. Lin- 
coln, 191. 

William, Emperor, 107 \ 
decides boundary ques- 
tion in favor of United 
States, 139; the man 



and emperor, 189-200 ; 
friendship for United 
States, 200, 201. 

Young Turk revolution, 



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